^.  ZH-.'oU. 


oi  ^^«  ^^'^^nm  ^-^^. 


<^^  PRINCETON,  N.  J. 


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Purchased   by  the    Hamill    Missionary   Fund. 


BV    2550    .A8    1904 


The  Asiatic  fields 


The  Asiatic  Fields 


V 


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,/ 


The  Asiatic  Fields 


<>& 


Addresses  delivered  before  the 
Eastern  Missionary  Con- 
vention of  the  Methodist  Epis- 
copal Church,  Philadelphia, 
Pa.,     October     13-15,     1903 


~~V^V\\\6\  .Qo'^'K.f^jrYWow  u\aar<s5s<ss 


NEW     YORK:     EATON     &     MAINS 
CINCINNATI  :  JENNINGS    &    PVE 


^ 


The  Philadelphia  Convention  Addresses  are  pub- 
lished in  a  series  of  seven  small  volumes,  of 
which  this  is  one.     The  volumes  are  entitled : 

A  CALL   TO  ADVANCE 

MISSIONS   AND  WORLD  MOVEMENTS 

THE  ASIATIC  FIELDS 

THE  AFRICAN,  EUROPEAN,  AND 
LATIN  AMERICAN  FIELDS 

GENERAL  SURVEY  AND  HOME  FIELDS 

YOUNG  PEOPLE  AND  MISSIONS 

THE  MISSIONARY  WORKSHOP 


Copyright,  1904,  by 
Eaton  &  Mains 


CONTENTS. 


PAGE 

I.  India ^. 7 

Bishop  James  M.  Thoburn,  D.D. 


II.   China:    The  Field  and  its  Con- 
quest .  .,v^. 30 

Rev.  Homer  Eaton,  D.  D. 


III.   Successes  and  Opportunities  in 
China.  .  .y( 

Rev,  James  Simester,  B.D. 


China  .  .  .y( 51 


IV.   Successes  and  Opportunities  in 

Korea ./\ 65 

V 

Rev.  George  Heber  Jones,  Ph.D. 

V.    Successes  and  Opportunities  in 

Japan  . . .  .^yf. 90 

Rev.  David  S.  Spencer,  D.D. 


The  Asiatic   Fields, 


I. 

INDIA. 

By  BISHOP  JAMES  M.  THOBURN,  D.D. 

I  HAVE  no  doubt  that  you  all  greatly  enjoy 
the  reports  you  hear  coming  in  from  the 
different  parts  of  the  world.  I  think  I  get 
more  pleasure,  however,  and  refreshment 
from  listening  to  those  reports  than  anyone 
else  present.  I  remember  very  vividly 
when  I  became  a  missionary,  and  I  am 
not  a  very  old  man  yet,  but  I  remember 
the  first  Conference  I  attended,  in  1858, 
when  I  saw  Dr.  Durbin  for  the  first  time, 
and  I  heard  him  speak,  and  he  gave  the  best 
report  he  possibly  could  of  our  missionary 
work.     It  was  almost  exclusively  confined 

7 


The:  Asiatic  Fidi^ds. 

to  the  work  among  the  American  Indians. 
I  can  remember  it.  He  stated  in  tones  I 
can  never  forget  that  after  ten  years'  faith- 
ful labor  on  the  part  of  our  missionaries 
in  China — and  I  repeat  his  words  when  I 
say  it — God  had  given  us  our  first  convert 
in  China.  And  the  great  Methodist 
preacher  seemed  as  happy  over  the  conver- 
sion of  that  one  Chinaman  as  you  have  been 
to-day  in  hearing  of  the  ten  thousand  con- 
verts from  the  East,  from  the  West,  and 
from  the  North  and  South,  and  from  almost 
every  part  of  this  globe.  I  have  said  I  have 
been  happy,  because  I  can  appreciate  the 
advance  of  these  years  as  perhaps  very  few 
of  you  can. 

Now  in  speaking  of  India  I  can  give 
you  only  a  very  hasty  sketch.  India  on 
the  map  is  one  thing  to  see,  and  the 
missionary  dominion  is  another.  We  have 
changed  the  title  of  our  mission  deliberately. 
We  say  no  longer  "the  Mission  to  India." 

8 


IlsDIA. 

It  is  our  ^'Mission  in  Southern  Asia" — a 
change  which  I  suggested  to  the  General 
Conference  in  1892. 

We  have  gone  beyond  the  shores  of  India 
and  have  taken  up  Malaysia  and  the  great 
islands  in  the  Indian  Archipelago,  and  also 
the  islands  of  the  Philippines.  We  in- 
clude in  our  field  the  kingdom  of  Siam, 
which  contains  three  million  Chinamen. 
Our  Presbyterian  brethren  out  there  have 
twice  come  in  person  to  see  me,  when  I 
visited  the  region  around  Singapore,  to 
urge  the  planting  of  a  mission  at  Bangkok, 
in  the  Chinese  community.  The  Presby- 
terians confined  themselves  to  work  among 
the  Siamese,  urging  us  to  take  up  work 
among  the  Chinese.  All  this  makes  a  very 
vast  region,  a  field  in  which  we  encounter 
the  usual  difficulties.  We  at  first  kept 
ourselves  confined  to  a  little  district  con- 
taining seventeen  million  people,  but  God 
has  in  the  last  few  years  clearly  led  us  far- 

9 


Thd  Asiatic  Fie:i,ds. 

ther  afield.  We  have  a  very  vast  territory 
and  we  are  preaching  in  thirty-five  lan- 
guages— and  the  number  I  may  say  is  annu- 
ally increasing.  We  have  gained  access  to 
many  classes,  to  some  extent  among  all  the 

classes. 

The:  Classes  Re:ache:d. 

You  may  meet  a  man  who  will  tell  you  he 
has  been  in  India  and  he  has  learned  of  our 
failure,  and  that  we  have  never  made  any 
Mohammedan  converts.  I  must  now  cor- 
rect that  mistaken  idea.  You  may  take  up 
the  appointments  in  almost  any  one  of  our 
Indian  Conferences  and  you  will  come  upon 
names,  one  after  another,  every  one  rep- 
resenting a  converted  Mohammedan.  They 
would  tell  you,  as  I  was  told  since  I  came 
to  this  convention,  that  the  intelligent  ob- 
server who  had  been  around  the  globe — and 
in  this  connection  I  would  say  that  taking  a 
trip  around  the  globe  does  not  necessarily 
make  a  man  intelligent — the  man  who  had 

10 


India. 

passed  around  the  globe  and  had  visited 
India,  had  formed  a  conclusion  that  there 
are  no  converts  among  the  natives  from  the 
higher  classes.  But  if  you  will  take  the  list 
of  appointments  of  the  Annual  Conferences 
you  will  find  the  names  of  many  Brahmans, 
and  of  many  Rajpoots,  who  stand  next  to 
the  Brahmans. 

We  have  converts  from  nearly  every  class 
in  our  list.  A  great  majority  come  from 
the  lowest  class,  which  we  call  there  the 
depressed  section  and  what  the  word  de- 
pressed means  you  will  perhaps  need  to 
have  explained.  Take  this  room,  and  away 
up  yonder  you  may  find  a  few  scattered  peo- 
ple. In  the  next  gallery  there  would  be 
more,  and  in  the  next  still  more,  and  then 
there  would  be  a  large  audience  on  this 
floor.  Well,  that  represents  the  exact  con- 
ditions of  Indian  society ;  the  Brahmans  are 
at  the  top,  and  are  very  high  up  in  the  social 

scale,  but  they  have  comparatively  very  little 

II 


The:  Asiatic  Fie;i.ds. 

influence  upon  the  masses  of  the  country. 
But  we  have  won  converts  from  among 
them  from  the  first,  and  we  have  very  many 
of  them,  and  we  get  them  every  year.  Then 
we  get  a  good  many  from  the  Rajpoots. 
They  have  been  very  exclusive,  but  I  re- 
member that  when  I  was  leaving  India  last 
March  Dr.  J.  E.  Scott  reported  to  me  that 
he  had  about  ten  thousand  of  the  Rajpoots 
as  candidates  for  baptism ;  that  is,  of  one  of 
the  highest  castes.  Then  we  come  to  the 
lower  range,  and  after  that  you  will  find  a 
still  lower  scale,  and  then  there  are  fifty 
million  people  below  the  lowest  scale  of  re- 
spectability. But  this  fifty  million  of  people 
are  cut  up  into  castes  also.  From  the  lowest 
of  the  low  to  the  highest  God  has  given 
us  converts. 

Uplifting  De;pre;sse:d  Classes. 

You  will  find  the  depressed  classes  are 
the  ones  that  at  the  present  time  are  the 

12 


India. 

most  accessible  and  are  being  converted  in 
large  numbers;  whole  villages,  thousands 
and  tens  of  thousands  of  people.    And  what 
does  it  mean?     It  indicates  that  they  have 
learned  that  there  is  no  hope  for  them  in 
Hinduism  and  no  hope  for  them  in  Moham- 
medanism and  no  hope  for  them  in  Bud- 
dhism;   their  only  hope  is  in  Christianity. 
And  they  can  understand  it.    For  instance, 
it  is  with  them  as  it  is  with  the  colored  peo- 
ple of  the  South  with  respect  to  education. 
There  are  public   schools   for  the  colored 
men  in  the  South ;  that  is,  entire  schools  that 
are  taught  by  white  teachers.    The  law  may 
technically  give  the  colored  pupil  the  right, 
but  public  sentiment  is  such  that  he  does  not 
go  to  a  white  school.     The  English  have 
schools  in  large  numbers  all  through  India. 
They  allow  every  parent  to  send  his  boy  to 
school,  but,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  the  children 
of  this  depressed  class  do  not  go.    It  would 
be  too  hot  for  them  if  they  were  admitted. 

13 


The:  Asiatic  Fie:i.ds. 

The  higher  classes  are  so  stupid  that,  in 
some  cases,  when  we  build  little  huts  for  all 
low-class  scholars  the  outraged  Brahmans 
come  and  destroy  and  set  fire  to  them,  for 
they  feel  we  are  doing  them  a  wrong  in  try- 
ing to  elevate  these  people;  but  when  the 
low-caste  people  become  Christians  they  are 
then  respectable.  They  are  Christians,  and 
the  title  allows  them  to  draw  water  from  the 
public  wells.  It  admits  them  to  the  schools. 
The  low-caste  Hindu  may  be  rejected  from 
the  school  door,  but  when  he  becomes  a 
Christian  he  gains  admittance.  Hence, 
there  is  a  great  movement  at  present  in  the 
direction  of  Christianity. 

But  some  one  says,  "Now  that  is  all  secu- 
lar, and  we  would  like  to  hear  of  the  spirit- 
ual work."  My  dear  friend,  there  is  no  truly 
spiritual  work  that  does  not  affect  the  secu- 
lar side  of  humanity;  you  cannot  separate 
them.  It  is  because  of  the  spiritual  element 
that  we  are  there  at  all,  and  it  is  because  of 

14 


India. 

the  spiritual  element  that  these  poor  fellows 
are  brought  to  us  in  the  movement  that  is 
going  on  now;    and  the  idea  is  abroad  in 
the  land— that  it  is  to  their  interest  to  become 
Christians— and  you  might  as  well  go  down 
to  the  seaside  and  raise  up  heaps  of  sand  in 
order  to  stop  the  inflow  of  the  tide  of  the  sea 
as  to  stop  the  men  who  have  commenced 
to  take  part  in  this  movement  among  the 
fifty  million  of  depressed  human  beings  in 
Southern  Asia. 

Capacity  f^or  Advanceme:nt. 

Now  you  ask  me,  'When  they  become 
Christians,  what  are  they  ?  Do  you  really 
find  that  they  have  the  capacity  for  advance- 
ment?" We  find  many  that  have.  There 
are  many  classes  that  can  understand  and 
do  advance.  They  are  divided  and  sub- 
divided. But  the  boys  in  our  schools  are 
able  to  compete  with  the  boys  in  any  of  the 
other  schools.     Moreover,  we  have  opened 

15 


The;  Asiatic  Fields. 

a  college  for  the  young  men  and  also  a 
college  for  the  young  women;     and  they 
have  the  right  to  be  side  by  side.    We  have 
a  bright  young  man,  one  of  the  notable 
preachers,  who  in  three  years'  time  after  he 
was  converted,  was  reading  the  Sanskrit — 
and  I  have  not  learned  it  in  the  past  forty- 
four  years!     I  do  meet  again  and  again 
many  of  this  depressed  class  who  have  just 
as  good  brain-power  as  any  of  the  others, 
and  for  the  present  I  am  content  to  teach 
such  men  as  these. 

Now  as  we  are  given  the  right  of  way  it 
has  led  us  to  this  point :  that  we  have  whole 
communities  asking  for  baptism,  thousands 
and  tens  of  thousands,  and  multitudes  be- 
yond, and  what  can  we  do  ?  To  give  you  an 
illustration  of  this  I  might  say  that  if  I  were 
to  go  back  again  to  that  country,  and  they 
were  to  bring  me  forward  twenty-five  con- 
verts, and  I  should  baptize  that  number 
every  day  for  three  hundred  and  sixty-five 

i6 


India. 

days  I  would  not  exhaust  the  number  at 
present  who  are  accepted  candidates  for 
baptism.  The  work  is  expanding  in  just 
that  way. 

Well,  some  one  has  said,  ''Why  don't  you 
go  on  and  baptize  them  at  once?"  Why,  a 
great  many  censure  us  for  baptizing  too 
rapidly ;  a  great  many  have  thought  that  we 
have  been  progressing  too  fast.  It  requires 
us  to  exert  a  specific  effort  to  hold  back  the 
work  in  that  respect,  and  for  this  reason: 
If  you  should  to-day  bring  a  million  of  peo- 
ple into  the  Church  who  don't  understand 
anything  at  all  about  Christ's  mission  on 
earth,  and  the  message  we  carry  to  them  in 
his  name,  it  would  not  do.  We  are  admit- 
ting them  as  rapidly  as  we  can,  but  this  is 
the  trend  this  especial  work  is  taking.  When 
I  go  back — I  expect  to  sail  next  week  for 
India — I  shall  say  to  our  missionaries :  "Se- 
lect a  dozen  men — youngish  men,  a  dozen  of 

the  very  best  men  you  can  get — and  give 
2  17 


Thk  Asiatic  Fie:i.ds. 

them  instruction  for  about  six  months,  and 
then  turn  them  out  among  the  people  to  im- 
part what  they  know,  and  after  three 
months  bring  them  back  again  and  give 
them  further  instruction  for  three  months 
more  and  then  send  them  back  again."  In 
this  way  we  would  train  our  men  while  they 
are  in  the  work,  and  before  two  years  have 
passed  away  a  thousand  men  would  have 
become  five  thousand.  We  stand  appalled, 
for  we  see  the  multitudes  coming. 

The  Power  o^  Vision. 

Some  have  said,  since  this  Convention 
began,  that  we  lack  vision.  It  may  be  we 
don't  all  understand  it.  I  wrote  back  some 
years  ago,  when  I  heard  there  was  a  book 
to  be  published  by  the  Church,  to  put  in 
one  chapter  on  "Vision."  I  venture  to  say 
it  is  a  gift  of  the  Spirit  of  God  that  will 
abide  in  the  Church  as  long  as  the  Spirit  of 
God  abides  in  human  hearts.    "Your  young 

i8 


India. 

men  shall  see  visions."  Those  visions  are 
one  of  God's  methods  of  teaching  us  all  the 
way  through  life.  I  have  found  that  chap- 
ter has  been  criticised  as  visionary,  and  per- 
chance it  may  be  to  some  people.  It  matters 
not  about  that,  but  visions  we  do  have,  and 
that  is  a  fact ;  and  I  am  going  to  tell  you  of 
a  vision  God  showed  to  me. 

I  went  on  a  visit  to  my  missionary  work- 
ers. I  went  up  to  Northern  India  and  felt, 
as  they  all  felt,  that  we  should  reach  some 
result,  now  that  we  had  come  together.  We 
had  twelve  men  who  were  to  be  ordained  as 
ministers.  The  whole  congregation  of  Chris- 
tians were  full  of  joy.  We  had  twelve  men 
as  preachers  of  the  word  who  were  to  be 
set  apart  for  the  work  by  the  laying  on  of 
hands  in  the  name  of  Jesus  Christ.  My  own 
heart  was  greatly  moved,  and  I  glanced 
over  the  audience  and  thought  of  the  future. 
Here  are  only  twelve ;  how  many  will  follow 
them?    As  I  went  down  to  lay  my  hands 

19 


Thd  Asiatic  Fields. 

upon  them  it  seemed  to  me  as  though  I  had 
a  vision  of  what  was  to  follow,  and  I  saw 
a  longer  line  behind  them,  and  a  still  longer 
row  behind  that  row,  and  then  another,  and 
then  another,  until  it  seemed  as  if  all  the 
way  to  the  distant  horizon  I  saw  a  great 
multitude  coming  to  God,  blessed  of  the 
Spirit  And  the  Spirit  said  to  me,  'Xo, 
these  are  they  who  are  to  take  up  this  work 
in  the  coming  years." 

So  three  years  passed  away  and  I  met  the 
Conference  again  in  the  same  church  in  the 
same  town,  and  I  laid  these  hands  on  fifty- 
three  men — the  twelve  had  become  fifty- 
three.  And  this  year  I  could,  if  I  would,  set 
apart  a  thousand  men  who  will  take  up  the 
work  and  go  into  it  and  raise  up  Christian 
communities,  and  beyond  that  thousand 
there  are  other  thousands  who,  no  doubt, 
will  be  converted  and  will  take  the  work  up. 
You  and  I  must  familiarize  ourselves  with 
this  matter,  for  there  will  be  tens  of  thou- 

20 


India. 

sands  of  men  set  apart  by  the  Spirit  of  the 
living  God  for  the  missions  of  our  Lord 
Jesus  Christ;  to  take  up  the  work  and  to 
make  him  known  to  the  perishing  milHons, 
yea,  hundreds  of  milHons. 

Vast  Multitudes  and  Mone:y. 

We  do  not  allow  ourselves,  really,  to  take 
in  a  clear  and  full  view  of  the  situation. 
Our  brethren  in  China  talk  about  four  hun- 
dred millions  and  you  don't  comprehend  it; 
and  we  talk  about  three  hundred  and  fifty 
millions  in  India,  and  verily  that  is  an  arith- 
metical expression  and  nothing  more.  But 
it  must  be  grasped. 

Christians  must  learn  to  live  entirely  by 
faith,  and  to  believe  that  a  man  must  also 
give  of  his  wealth,  in  the  name  of  Jesus 
Christ,  for  the  salvation  of  the  perishing 
world.  He  must  do  it,  to  be  a  Christian.  We 
must  give  more  and  more  of  our  abundance, 
and  we  must  give  more  and  more  from  our 

21 


The  Asiatic  Fie;i.ds. 

poverty ;  and  the  great  Christian  hosts  of 
this  world  will  do  it  when  they  come  to 
evangelize  the  world  and  are  made  to  see 
the  actual  conditions  as  they  exist.  How 
will  you  fill  the  treasury  so  that  these  men 
will  be  supported,  and  how  will  you  bring 
forward  the  means  to  this  all-important 
end? 

India's  Ni:w  Womanhood. 

I  wish  I  had  time  to  just  mention  in 
a  word  what  God  has  been  doing  dur- 
ing these  years  in  India.  Our  mission  was 
among  seventeen  millions  and  there  were 
not  seventeen  girls  that  could  read  a  single 
line.  I  remember  when  I  urged  the  people 
to  educate  their  daughters  they  told  us  it 
was  absolutely  unnecessary.  The  women 
could  not  learn;  they  had  not  the  brains. 
Then  we  instanced  our  wives  and  daugh- 
ters, and  said  that  they  had  learned  to  read, 
and  the  reply  was:  "O,  they  are  different; 
you  have  a  different  kind  of  a  home.    Our 

22 


India. 

women  cannot  do  it,  and  if  they  could  do 
it  it  would  be  a  wrong  thing  to  teach  them." 
And  right  there,  in  that  community,  we 
have  founded  a  woman's  college,  and  we 
have  native  women  to-day  in  that  institu- 
tion who  have  attained  as  high  an  average 
as  your  women  college  graduates  in  the 
United  States.  We  have  thousands  and 
thousands  of  girls  now  going  to  the  Chris- 
tian schools. 

You  may  say  that  the  culture  of  Christian 
women  has  not  only  been  introduced  there, 
but  a  new  womanhood.  It  is  seen  in  the 
person  of  these  women  converts,  and 
woman  has  now  been  emancipated.  How  is 
it?  A  high-class  Hindu  woman  will  now 
go  to  the  Christian  schools,  and  I  have  seen 
them  seated  on  the  benches  studying  side 
by  side  with  their  poorer  sisters.  You  will 
find  this  in  many  parts  of  India.  If  Chris- 
tianity has  done  nothing  more  than  to  eman- 
cipate the  intellect  of  Indian  womanhood  it 

23 


The;  Asiatic  Fidlds. 

would  have  compensated  a  thousand  times 
over  for  every  dollar  of  money  ever  sent 
abroad. 

BUII.DING  A  Christian  Lite:rature:. 

Then  there  is  the  work  of  literature.  We 
are  publishing  several  newspapers  in  India 
to-day  exclusively  for  the  natives,  and  it 
is  guaranteed  that  there  shall  not  be  a  line 
in  any  of  them  that  would  be  offensive  to 
the  delicacy  of  an  Indian  woman.  We  have 
fxve  of  these  papers  being  circulated  all  the 
time.  Young  women  are  living  somewhere 
in  the  United  States  to-day  who  will  have 
to  come  out  to  the  Eastern  world  to  lay  the 
foundation  of  Christian  literature  for 
women  and  for  that  coming  Christianity  of 
the  East.  We  can  take  books  and  have 
them  translated  into  the  Chinese  and  other 
oriental  languages,  and  we  can  take  theirs 
and  translate  them  into  our  own  language. 
Think  of  building  up  a  literature  for  the 

24 


India. 

men  and  women  of  the  Eastern  world. 
What  a  task !  We  want  your  thousands,  we 
want  your  milHons.  And  they  are  coming. 
We  are  going  to  have  them. 

We  have  men  now  in  Bombay  and  in 
Madras  engaged  in  this  work,  and  we  have 
five  pubHshing  houses ;  and  in  the  southeast 
we  have  a  business  house  from  which  books 
and  Hterature  are  sent  to  Manila.  We  have 
a  man  at  the  present  time,  known  to  many 
of  you,  Dr.  Rudisill,  formerly  of  Baltimore, 
living  in  Madras.  He  is  a  man  familiar 
with  the  vernacular  and  a  man  of  devotion ; 
this  you  will  find  out  the  minute  you  ap- 
proach him.  I  think  you  do  appreciate  him, 
and  I  am  glad  of  it ;  for  you  should  appre- 
ciate him  at  his  value.  And  if  you  send 
him  $10,000  he  will  show  you  what  he  will 
do  with  it.  He  needs  just  that  sum  of 
money  at  the  present  time.  If  you  could 
give  him  $20,000  I  believe  he  has  agencies 
where  it  could  be  placed,  and  it  would  give 

25 


The:  Asiatic  Fiei^ds. 

a  new  impetus  to  the  publishing  work  for 
the  next  hundred  years. 

Our  RESPONSIBII.ITY. 

We  have  had  all  along  to  struggle  as  if 
we  were  beggars,  with  this  condition  of 
things  staring  us  in  the  face  and  without 
money.  It  is  always  this  one  thing  that 
seems  to  be  needed,  and  when  I  think  of  it 
I  may  use  some  strong  language  to  express 
what  I  would  say.  In  my  appeal  I  fear  I  have 
used  terms  which  sound  more  like  a  demand, 
because  I  realize  in  my  inmost  soul  the  great 
responsibility  that  is  lying  upon  us  in  this 
extraordinary  age ;  and  at  the  present  time 
it  is  chiefly  a  financial  responsibility.  The 
missionaries  can  be  found  if  the  money  is 
provided.  It  is  simply  a  question  of  gather- 
ing it  together,  and  if  the  work  is  to  be  done 
people  must  be  set  to  work  to  get  it. 

I  have  had  men  come  with  the  kindest  of 
feeling,  and  they  have  spoken  of  the  many 

26 


India. 

years  I  have  been  in  the  field,  and  have  as- 
sured me  of  their  heart's  sympathy  with 
me  in  the  work.  My  dear  brothers,  when 
you  have  felt  in  prayer  that  you  were  un- 
willing to  leave  your  fireside  even  for  this 
movement — and  when  you  have  had  the  as- 
surance in  your  heart  that  you  were  the 
disciple  of  Jesus  Christ — has  it  ever  oc- 
curred to  you  that  the  interests  in  India 
were  your  interests  ?  Having  these  feelings 
very  deeply  in  your  heart,  have  you  ever  felt 
the  desire  to  see  that  those  interests  were 
conserved,  and  that  the  Saviour  desires  it 
infinitely  more,  and  that  you  ought  to  be 
moved  to  do  for  him  what  your  village 
sweep  would  do  for  him — and  even  some- 
thing more  than  that?  For  remember  it  is 
a  work  for  the  Master. 

Christ  Walking  Among  the  Nations. 

O,  if  we  only  realized  that  He  who  once 
walked  among  the  hills  of  Galilee  is  walk- 

27 


The:  Asiatic  Fie:i,ds. 

ing  about  to-day  among  the  nations  and  that 
he  has  girded  up  his  loins  and  is  going  to 
release  them  from  their  agony !  There 
are  more  good  men  and  women  in  this 
world  than  we  allow  ourselves  to  believe.  I 
do  not  believe  that  this  world  is  all  going  to 
everlasting  wreck. 

I  believe  God  has  his  plans.  He  is  above 
us.  He  is  taking  account  of  the  course  of 
nations,  and  among  all  the  responsible  men 
and  women  in  this  world  there  are  enough 
to  carry  forward  the  missionary  campaign 
of  Jesus  Christ.  So  we  are  those  upon 
whom  the  weightiest  responsibility  rests  to- 
day, and  I  praise  God  from  my  inmost  soul 
that,  in  the  years  I  trust  yet  distant,  the 
Lord  Jesus  Christ  will  lay  his  hand  upon 
this  poor  unworthy  head  and  recognize  in 
his  servant  one  who  has  been  his  follower 
and  one  of  his  missionaries  in  that  far-off 
field,  and  has  represented  the  missionary  in- 
terests  of   Methodism   in  the   world.     We 

28 


India. 

were  a  few  at  first ;  we  are  more  now,  and 
we  will  be  a  multitude  not  many  years 
hence;  and  may  God  hasten  the  day  when 
we  can  count  our  Methodist  missionaries  by 
the  thousands ! 

29 


II. 

CHINA:   THE  FIELD  AND  ITS 
CONQUEST. 

By  REV.  HOMER  EATON,  D.D. 

The  problems  which  present  themselves 
for  solution  in  the  prosecution  of  Christian 
work  in  all  heathen  nations  are  many  and 
great.  Especially  is  this  so  in  the  great 
empire  of  China.  Here  is  a  vast  population, 
estimated  at  something  over  four  hundred 
millions,  spread  over  a  wide  expanse  of  ter- 
ritory, the  subjects  of  a  government  hostile 
to  Christianity,  and  even  opposed  to  the 
presence  of  foreigners  in  the  country,  to 
whom  the  Christian  world  is  seeking  to 
carry  the  Gospel  of  the  Son  of  God.  The 
work  of  evangelizing  these  people   is  one 

30 


China. 

of  no  ordinary  magnitude,  and  must  be  at- 
tended with  untold  difficulties. 

Here  is  one  of  the  most  ancient  govern- 
ments known  to  history,  with  venerable  re- 
ligious beliefs  and  the  most  firmly  rooted 
superstitions,  for  which  the  people  in  every 
part  of  the  empire  are  ready  and  willing  to 
die. 

Confucianism,  Buddhism,  and  Taoism  are 
the  dominant  faiths,  and  are  everywhere 
prevalent.  The  first  presents  a  system  of 
morals  containing  much  that  is  pure  and 
good,  but  the  last  two  are  rank  superstition 
and  idolatry.  To  overthrow  these  and  build 
up  the  kingdom  of  Christ  in  China  is  the 
task  to  which  the  Christian  Church  has  set 
herself. 

That  the  work  will  be  toilsome  and  slow 
must  be  expected.  Much  money  and  many 
years  of  earnest  and  self-sacrificing  labor 
have  already  been  expended,  and  multitudes 
of  converts  have  been  made,  but  the  great 

31 


The:  Asiatic  Fields. 

field  has  only  been  touched  on  its  outer  rim. 
How  shall  the  interior  be  reached  and  the 
whole  vast  area  be  brought  under  the  influ- 
ence and  saving  power  of  the  Gospel? 

The  Present  Situation. 

Let  us  look  at  the  situation  as  it  is  to-day. 
Leaving  out  of  view  for  the  present  the  mis- 
sionary enterprises  of  other  Christian  de- 
nominations or  organizations,  let  us  take  a 
survey  of  the  work  of  our  own  Church,  and 
note  some  of  the  successes  already  achieved. 

First  of  all,  we  have  a  strong  center  at 
Foochow,  in  the  southerly  portion  of  the 
empire.  Here  our  work  in  China  began.  At 
first  it  was  slow  and  discouraging,  but  in 
more  recent  years  its  progress  has  been 
more  rapid.  School,  hospital,  and  evangel- 
istic work  are  being  prosecuted  with  great 
success.  A  large  Church  membership  has 
been  gathered,  and  the  number  is  rapidly 
increasing. 

32 


China. 

In  Central  and  West  China  we  have  es- 
tabhshed  ourselves  at  various  ports  on  the 
great  Yang-tse  River  and  in  the  adjacent 
country,  planting  schools,  hospitals,  and 
churches  in  which  most  important  and  suc- 
cessful work  is  being  done.  Our  schools  are 
filled  with  young  men  who  are  eager  to 
learn,  our  hospitals  are  crowded  with  all 
classes  from  the  highest  to  the  lowest  seek- 
ing relief  from  bodily  disease  and  suffering, 
and  our  houses  of  worship  are  thronged 
with  attentive  listeners  to  the  truth,  and 
many  are  being  converted  and  brought  into 
the  Church. 

Going  north  through  the  Yellow  Sea  and 
up  the  Peiho  River  to  Tientsin,  we  find  an- 
other center  occupied  in  strength  and  show- 
ing a  large  and  growing  work.  We  have 
in  the  foreign  settlement  at  Tientsin  a  well- 
equipped  school  crowded  with  Chinese  boys, 
and  a  commodious  church  edifice  where  na- 
tives in  large  numbers  assemble  for  divine 
3  33 


The  Asiatic  Fields. 

worship.  Our  two  street  chapels  in  the 
old  walled  city  were  destroyed  during  the 
Boxer  uprising  in  1900  and  have  not  yet 
been  rebuilt.  Two  other  preaching  places 
have  been  secured,  however,  where  evan- 
gelistic services  are  held  daily. 

Passing  on  to  Peking,  the  capital  of  the 
empire,  we  are  introduced  to  a  property 
and  a  work  that,  in  view  of  recent  events, 
are  most  gratifying  and  full  of  encourage- 
ment. We  had  accumulated  a  strong  work- 
ing force,  built  up  a  fine  property,  and  es- 
tablished a  most  successful  work  here  prior 
to  the  great  Boxer  uprising  of  1900.  The 
cloud  which  then  gathered  over  the  heads 
of  all  foreigners  broke  in  terrible  fury, 
sweeping  away  all  our  buildings,  leaving 
nothing  but  great  heaps  of  rubbish,  and 
causing  our  missionaries  to  flee  for  their 
lives.  Many  native  Christians  were  cruelly 
murdered,  and  devastation  and  ruin  reigned 
supreme. 

34 


China. 

When  the  memorable  siege  of  the  lega- 
tions was  raised,  and  our  faithful  mission- 
aries and  the  surviving  native  Christians 
came  forth  from  what  it  was  feared  would 
be  to  all  the  house  of  death,  they  saw  such 
desolation  as  their  eyes  had  never  before 
looked  upon;  and  we  do  not  wonder  that 
they  were  filled  with  anguish  and  dismay. 
It  seemed  for  the  moment  that  the  results 
of  the  labor  of  years  had  been  well-nigh  de- 
stroyed, and  that  it  would  require  a  genera- 
tion or  more  to  restore  the  work  to  its  for- 
mer proportions.  But  such  fears  were 
groundless.  It  was  my  privilege  a  few 
weeks  ago  to  walk  over  the  ground  that 
had  been  made  desolate,  and  to  note  the 
rapidity  with  which  all  things  connected 
with  our  work  are  assuming  their  former 
proportions  and  even  putting  on  new 
strength   and   beauty. 

Such,  in  brief,  is  the  condition  of  our 
work  in  China  to-day.     While  much  has 

35 


Th^  Asiatic  Fie:i,ds. 

already  been  accomplished  and  a  healthful 
growth  is  observable  in  all  our  missions, 
the  conditions  now  existing  in  the  empire 
should  be  carefully  studied  and  the  best 
methods  sought  out  for  reaching  the  people 
with  the  great  truths  of  Christianity.  Dur- 
ing my  brief  stay  in  China  and  my  hurried 
observations  of  the  conditions  prevailing 
there,  a  few  things  profoundly  impressed 
me.    Of  some  of  these  let  me  speak. 

The  VitaIv  Importanci:  o^  Educationai, 
Work. 

The  Chinese  are  not  wanting  in  a  knowl- 
edge of  the  principles  of  government  and 
civil  life.  They  have  a  complete  code  of 
laws — a  code  that  would  not  be  discredit- 
able to  any  European  government — and  or- 
dinarily they  are  not  slow  nor  lax  in  the 
enforcement  of  these  laws.  In  China,  how- 
ever, it  is  often  possible  for  criminals  to 
purchase  immunity  from  punishment. 

36 


China. 

They  have  also  a  wonderful  literature,  a 
literature  which  has  come  down  to  them 
from  remote  centuries.  Men  who  can  af- 
ford the  expense  are  everywhere  striving  to 
the  utmost  of  their  ability  to  secure  a  degree 
in  literature,  and  year  after  year  they  pre- 
sent themselves  at  some  one  of  the  great 
examination  halls  in  different  cities  of  the 
empire  to  compete  for  the  degrees  which  are 
to  be  conferred. 

Their  studies  are  largely  confined  to  the 
ancient  Chinese  classics,  and  the  knowledge 
they  acquire  is  of  little  practical  benefit  to 
them.  In  a  sense,  therefore,  the  educated 
classes  are  ignorant,  being  utter  strangers 
to  a  broad  and  practical  education  such  as 
the  schools  of  other  countries  afford,  and 
such  as  fits  a  man  for  the  highest  and  most 
profitable  pursuits  in  life. 

This  the  bright  and  progressive  young 
men  of  China  are  beginning  to  see,  and 
they  are  seeking  more  and  more  the  advan- 

37 


The  Asiatic  Fie:i,ds. 

tages  which  foreign  schools  afford.  Even 
the  government  officials  are  coming  to  rec- 
ognize the  importance  of  giving  the  young 
men  of  the  country  a  Western  education, 
and  they  have  already  established  a  few 
schools  and  colleges  on  foreign  lines.  For 
these  institutions  they  seek  and  must  have 
teachers  from  abroad.  It  is  a  signifi- 
cant, and  to  us  an  important,  fact  that 
trained  missionary  teachers  are  preferred, 
and  American  missionaries  are  in  highest 
demand. 

ScHooi,s  The:  Key  to  the  Situation. 

So  far  as  modern  school  work  in  China 
is  concerned,  the  missionaries  have  the  field. 
Their  educational  work  is  appreciated,  and 
more  students  are  seeking  admission  to  our 
schools  than  can  be  accommodated.  To  my 
mind,  the  schools  of  our  missions  are  the 
key  to  the  situation.  To  strengthen  them 
and  increase  their  number  and  efficiency  is 

38 


China. 

to  strengthen  and  extend  our  evangelistic 
work. 

In  sending  missionaries  to  China,  as  to 
other  heathen  countries,  the  great  and  all- 
absorbing  thought  is  to  preach  the  Gospel 
of  Christ  to  the  people  and  win  them  to  the 
cross.  While  this  thought  and  purpose 
should  ever  be  uppermost  in  the  mind  and 
effort  of  the  Church,  the  fact  that  the  basis 
of  all  successful  evangelistic  work  is  educa- 
tion must  not  be  overlooked.  While  we 
are  commanded  by  our  Lord  to  go  preach, 
we  are  commanded  also  to  go  teach  all 
nations. 

That  the  success  of  the  missionary  work 
of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church  in  China 
has  been  so  marked  is  due  largely  to  the 
fact  that  very  soon  after  entering  upon  it 
we  recognized  the  importance  of  establish- 
ing schools  of  different  grades  and  acted 
accordingly. 

A  brief  examination  of  our  educational 
39 


The:  Asiatic  Fidi^ds. 

work  and  its  results  will  show  the  wisdom 
of  its  founding,  and  the  importance  of  in- 
creasing its  strength  and  efficiency  by 
furnishing  the  men  and  means  necessary 
thereto. 

Universities  and  their  Feeders. 

It  is  an  acknowledged  fact  that  our  uni- 
versities at  Peking  and  Nanking  and  the 
Anglo-Chinese  College  at  Foochow  stand 
foremost  among  the  institutions  of  learning 
in  China.  Important  feeders  to  these  insti- 
tutions of  higher  learning  are  the  day 
schools  which  have  been  established  in  hun- 
dreds of  places  throughout  our  mission  ter- 
ritory, and  which  are  rapidly  increasing  in 
number.  This  phase  of  Christian  work  in 
China  has  never  been  made  especially  prom- 
inent in  the  reports  which  have  come  to  us 
from  the  field,  and  I  fear  its  real  value  is 
far  too  little  known  and  appreciated  in  the 
home  Church. 

40 


China. 

What  are  the  day  schools  ?  Small  apart- 
ments are  secured  at  various  points  in  the 
great  cities  and  in  rural  towns,  where 
twenty  or  thirty  boys  from  eight  to  thirteen 
years  of  age  come  together  each  day  for 
instruction.  The  teachers  in  these  schools 
are  native  Christians,  and  their  influence 
over  the  boys  is  most  salutary.  While  giv- 
ing instruction  in  the  rudiments  of  Chinese 
literature,  they  also  teach  them  the  doctrines 
of  the  Christian  religion  and  seek  to  bring 
them  to  a  personal  knowledge  of  the  Sav- 
iour. In  the  Foochow  Conference  alone, 
there  are  two  hundred  or  more  of  these 
schools,  with  about  five  thousand  boys  in 
attendance.  Some  of  these  schools  have 
been  opened  in  places  where  no  preaching 
service  had  ever  been  held,  and  the  schools 
prepared  the  way,  and  even  created  a  de- 
mand, for  the  preaching  of  the  Gospel. 

It  was  my  privilege  in  the  early  summer 
of  1903  to  visit  several  of  the  day  schools 

41 


The;  Asiatic  Fidi^ds. 

within  the  old  walled  city  of  Foochow.  The 
boys  seemed  greatly  interested  in  their 
studies,  and  I  was  told  that  they  make  rapid 
progress  in  acquiring  knowledge.  One  of 
the  schools  which  I  visited  is  held  in  a 
Buddhist  temple,  the  room  being  leased  for 
the  purpose.  Here,  where  many  idols  are 
seen,  with  incense  burning  on  the  altars  be- 
fore them,  Chinese  boys  were  learning  of 
the  true  God  and  of  our  Saviour,  Jesus 
Christ.  They  recited  to  me  through  an  in- 
terpreter some  of  the  lessons  they  had 
learned  from  the  New  Testament,  and  sang 
to  me  the  songs  of  our  holy  religion.  It 
was  soul-stirring  to  hear  them. 

It  is  a  recognized  fact  that  even  in  Chris- 
tian lands  we  must  seek  by  every  means 
possible  to  instruct  the  children  in  the  great 
truths  of  the  Bible  and  impress  upon  young 
minds  the  verities  of  the  Christian  religion 
if  we  would  surely  find  them  in  the  ranks 

of  Christian  believers  and  earnest  Church 

42 


China. 

workers  in  their  mature  years.  If  this  be 
true  of  the  children  of  nominal  Christian 
homes  in  an  enlightened  Christian  country, 
what  shall  we  say  of  the  importance  and 
even  necessity  of  bringing  heathen  children 
under  religious  instruction,  before  the  idol- 
atrous beliefs  and  superstitious  teachings  of 
their  people  bind  their  souls  in  chains  almost 
too  strong  to  be  broken?  We  cannot  too 
strongly  emphasize  the  importance  of  this 
work  among  the  boys  of  China;  and  the 
marvelous  success  already  achieved  in  the 
work  should  stimulate  the  Church  to  far 
more  liberal  giving  for  its  support. 

Next  come  the  high  schools  for  boys 
which  we  have  established  in  goodly  num- 
bers, and  which  are  crowded  with  young 
men  eager  to  secure  a  liberal  Western  edu- 
cation. Out  from  the  high  schools  and  the 
preparatory  schools  these  young  men  come 
seeking  admission  to  our  colleges  and  uni- 
versities.    Prominent  in  the  curriculum  of 

43 


The;  Asiatic  Fiei^ds. 

all  our  schools  is  the  study  of  the  Holy 
Scriptures  and  the  doctrines  of  the  Chris- 
tian religion;  and  it  is  a  notable  fact  that 
comparatively  few  students  graduate  from 
our  institutions  of  learning  in  China  with- 
out embracing  the  Christian  faith  and  ex- 
periencing the  power  of  Christ  to  save. 
Many  of  them  enter  the  ministry  and  go 
forth  to  preach  the  Gospel  in  its  simplic- 
ity and  power  to  their  own  people.  The 
importance,  therefore,  of  enlarging  and 
strengthening  our  schools  of  all  grades  in 
China  cannot  be  overestimated. 

Mi:dicaIv  Work. 

/  was  deeply  impressed  also  with  the  im- 
portance of  our  medical  work  in  hospitals 
and  in  the  homes  of  the  people.  There  are 
no  Chinese  physicians  worthy  the  name  ex- 
cept the  few  that  have  been  trained  in  our 
schools  or  graduated  from  medical  colleges 
in  this  country.    The  cures  wrought  and  the 

44 


China. 

successful  surgical  operations  performed  by 
our  missionary  physicians  seem  miraculous 
to  the  natives  of  China.  Our  hospitals  are 
filled  v/ith  patients.  Our  dispensaries  are 
thronged  with  people  seeking  remedies  for 
their  bodily  ailments,  and  our  physicians 
have  more  calls  to  visit  the  sick  in  their 
homes  than  can  possibly  be  answered.  In 
connection  with  all  this  medical  work, 
Christian  teaching  is  faithfully  and  earnestly 
practiced,  and  with  many  a  poor  sufferer 
the  healing  touch  comes  to  the  soul  as  well 
as  to  the  body.  Thus  our  medical  mission- 
aries are  given  access  to  many  homes  and 
hearts  that  otherwise  would  be  forever 
closed  to  them. 

EvANGKi^isTic  Work. 

And  now,  having  brought  the  boys  and 
young  men  of  a  community  under  the  in- 
fluence of  Christian  schools,  and  having 
broken  down  the  prejudices  and  overcome 

45 


Thi:  Asiatic  Fie:i.ds. 

many  of  the  superstitions  of  the  people, 
through  our  medical  work,  we  are  prepared 
to  prosecute  evangelistic  work  with  greater 
efficiency  and  success. 

You  must  not  understand  me  as  in  any 
way  undervaluing  evangelistic  work  and  the 
plain,  forceful  preaching  of  the  Gospel  to 
the  pagan  millions  of  China.  Our  chief 
work  is  to  bring  these  people  to  a  knowl- 
edge of  the  true  God  and  to  a  saving  faith 
in  Jesus  Christ,  his  Son.  It  is  only  to  make 
the  preaching  of  the  Gospel  more  effective 
and  a  great  harvest  of  souls  more  sure  that 
I  plead  for  the  enlargement  of  our  school 
and  hospital  work.  With  these  forces  com- 
bined and  working  in  harmony  the  power 
of  paganism  must  ultimately  be  broken  and 
Christianity  triumph  throughout  this  mighty 
empire. 

From  the  founding  of  Protestant  missions 
in  China  until  now  evangelistic  work  has 
been  vigorously  prosecuted  in  that  country. 

46 


China. 

All  possible  means  have  been  employed  to 
make  the  all-important  work  of  soul-win- 
ning effective.  Preaching  services  are  held 
in  street  chapels  and  on  the  open  streets; 
also  at  village  fairs,  where  it  is  com- 
paratively easy  to  gather  a  large  crowd  of 
listeners  attentive  to  the  Gospel  message. 
Special  revival  meetings  are  frequently  held 
in  our  churches,  and  sometimes  with  mar- 
velous results.  Sunday  schools  are  organ- 
ized in  connection  with  our  churches  and 
chapels  wherever  possible,  and  all  kinds  of 
Church  work  are  carried  on  very  much  as 
in  the  home  country.  These  various  agen- 
cies are  accomplishing  untold  good,  and 
through  them  many  benighted  pagans  are 
being  brought  into  the  light  and  liberty  of 
the  sons  of  God. 

Unparai,i,e:i,e:d  Opportunitiks. 

The  opportunities  for  successful  Chris- 
tian work  in  China  were  never  so  numerous 

47 


The;  Asiatic  Fie:i.ds. 

and  great  as  now.  Study  the  country  and 
its  conditions  to-day  and  you  will  see  how 
the  opportunities  for  successful  missionary 
work  have  been  multiplied  within  the  last 
decade.  Sail  with  me  up  the  Yang-tse 
River  two  thousand  miles  from  its  mouth, 
and  observe  the  great  walled  cities  which 
appear  at  frequent  intervals  along  its  banks. 
These  cities  contain  vast  populations,  and 
are  now  treaty  ports  where  all  foreigners 
are  assured  protection  by  the  Chinese  gov- 
ernment and  are  free  to  prosecute  mission- 
ary work  and  hold  property  under  the  name 
of  their  various  societies  for  missionary  pur- 
poses. Sail  up  and  down  the  seacoast,  call 
at  the  harbors  and  survey  the  great  towns 
that  receive  the  commerce  of  the  interior 
and  ship  the  products  of  the  country  to  all 
parts  of  the  world,  and  remember  that  these 
also  are  treaty  ports  where  missionaries  are 
promised  protection  in  their  work  by  the 
new  treaty  made  during  the  present  year 

48 


China. 

between  China  and  the  United  States.  How 
different  the  situation  to-day  from  that  of 
a  few  years  ago  when  treaty  ports  were  few 
and  the  privileges  of  foreigners  greatly  cur- 
tailed throughout  the  empire.  New  and 
most  favorable  opportunities  now  present 
themselves  to  us  for  successful  Christian 
work  in  China,  opportunities  which  our 
great  Church  should  not  be  slow  in  improv- 
ing. Every  treaty  port  should  be  occupied 
at  the  earliest  day  possible,  schools  and  hos- 
pitals established,  evangelistic  work  inau- 
gurated, and  these  great  commercial  centers 
made  the  centers  of  missionary  activity. 

These  are  strategic  points  and  should  be 
occupied  in  force.  With  preparatory  schools 
and  colleges  in  which  to  educate  the  young 
men  who  come  to  us  for  instruction,  we 
shall  soon  gather  a  strong  working  force  of 
trained  native  preachers.  Then,  as  our  Lord 
"called  unto  him  the  twelve,  and  began  to 
send  them  forth  by  two  and  two"  into  the 
4  49 


The  Asiatic  Fii:i.ds. 

cities  and  villages  round  about,  command- 
ing them  to  preach  that  ''men  should  re- 
pent," so  these  thoroughly  equipped  native 
preachers  may  be  sent  forth  ''by  two  and 
two,"  in  true  apostolic  fashion,  to  preach  the 
Gospel  to  their  own  people  in  the  cities  and 
villages  of  the  interior.  Thus,  slowly  it  may 
be,  but  surely,  shall  the  kingdom  of  our  di- 
vine Lord  spread  over  China  until  that 
mighty  pagan  empire  shall  become  the  in- 
heritance of  Christ  our  King. 

50 


III. 

SUCCESSES  AND  OPPORTU- 
NITIES IN  CHINA. 

By  REV.  JAMES  SIMESTER,  B.D. 

The  line  between  success  and  opportu- 
nity cannot  be  distinctly  drawn.  Opportu- 
nities improved,  by  the  grace  of  God,  become 
successes,  and  every  success  opens  a  wider 
door  of  opportunity. 

I.   Successes. 

There  are  three  ways  of  measuring  the 
success  of  Christian  missions  in  China — by 
the  numerical  results  actually  achieved,  by 
the  moral  and  spiritual  transformations 
which  are  the  direct  result  of  Christian  ef- 
fort, and  by  the  forces  which  have  been 

51 


Thi;  Asiatic  Fie:ivDS. 

set  at  work  as  the  result  of  Christian  mis- 
sions, but  which  are  themselves  not  con- 
nected with  the  Church. 

I.  There  are  125,000  baptized  Protestant 
Christians,  in  China  and  as  many  more  who 
have  adopted  the  Christian  faith.  When 
we  consider  the  circumstances  under  which 
these  results  have  been  achieved  these  num- 
bers are  amazing.  China  has  been  one  of 
the  most  difficult  fields  ever  entered  by  the 
Christian  Church.  In  no  other  country  were 
the  people  so  satisfied  with  themselves,  their 
nation,  and  their  religion.  In  no  other  field, 
save  Africa  and  Malaysia,  has  the  climate 
been  so  fatal  to  the  life  and  health  of  the 
missionary  as  in  South  China,  where  our 
work  was  begun.  No  other  country,  save 
India,  feels  so  bitterly  the  ostracism  conse- 
quent upon  the  acceptance  of  the  Christian 
religion.  In  no  other  mission  field  have  the 
workers  been  so  frequently  compelled  to 
flee  for  their  lives.    All  the  obstacles  found 

52 


China. 

in  any  land  have  been  met  in  China,  while 
here  also  are  found  difficulties  not  arising  in 
any  other  land  to  any  great  extent. 

Attention  has  been  called  to  the  apparent 
readiness  of  the  Japanese  to  receive  Chris- 
tian truth  as  compared  with  the  Chinese. 
But  it  should  be  remembered  that  when 
Japan  was  opened  to  intercourse  with  the 
outside  world  it  was  done  by  a  nation  that 
helped  the  Japanese  to  carry  out  their  own 
laws  and  develop  in  their  own  way.  When 
China  was  opened  up  it  was  by  nations  that 
compelled  her,  against  her  will,  to  admit 
the  curse  which  is  now  dragging  millions  of 
her  people  to  ruin.  She  was  compelled  to 
obey  laws  other  than  her  own  and  develop 
as  her  oppressors  saw  fit.  America  went  to 
Japan  as  the  good  shepherd,  that  the  people 
might  have  life  and  that  they  might  have 
it  more  abundantly.  England  and  the  Pow- 
ers went  to  China  as  a  thief  to  steal  and  to 
kill   and   to   destroy.     And   how   were  the 

53 


The:  Asiatic  Fields. 

Chinese  to  know  that  the  missionaries  were 
not  wolves  in  sheep's  clothing?  Treated  as 
they  have  been  by  the  foreigner,  the  won- 
der is  that  any  have  been  found  in  this  land 
willing  to  give  an  attentive  ear  to  any  mes- 
sage coming  from  so  hateful  a  source.  In 
the  face  of  these  difficulties,  the  fact  that 
nearly  a  quarter  of  a  million  souls  are  con- 
nected with  the  Christian  Church  as  mem- 
bers and  adherents  is  marvelous. 

But  the  numbers  added  to  the  Christian 
Church  are  not  the  greatest  evidence  of  suc- 
cess. Better  things  have  been  done,  and 
forces  have  been  set  at  work  which  increase 
the  efficiency  of  Christianity  in  geometrical 
progression.  Colleges  in  which  are  found 
thousands  of  young  men  dot  the  land.  In- 
termediate schools  for  boys  and  girls  are 
many  and  crowded,  and  day  schools  can  be 
counted  by  the  thousand.  There  are  nearly 
a  thousand  in  the  Fukien  province  alone. 
Hospitals  are  daily  ministering  to  thousands 

54 


China. 

of  sick  bodies  while  pointing  sin-sick  souls 
to  the  Great  Physician.  Printing  presses 
and  Bible  Societies  are  printing  annually 
millions  of  pages  of  the  Scriptures  and  other 
Christian  literature, 

2.  But  a  question  of  vital  importance  is 
asked.  Does  Christ  actually  save  and  trans- 
form the  Chinese?  Not,  "How  many  are 
saved?"  but  "How  well  are  they  saved?" 
China  has  furnished  to  the  world  the  great- 
est evidence  of  Christianity  seen  since  the 
resurrection  of  Christ.  Ten  thousand  native 
Christians  dying  for  their  faith  bear  evi- 
dence how  well  they  are  saved. 

Jesus  Christ  is  transforming  men  in  China 
as  effectually  as  he  ever  did  in  America. 
Highway  robbers  have  become  preachers ; 
men  deprived  of  mental  and  physical 
strength  by  the  use  of  opium  have  been 
made  strong ;  men  guilty  of  every  conceiva- 
ble sin  have  been  gloriously  saved;  homes 
have  been  transformed  so  that  I  have  seen 

55 


The  Asiatic  Fieilds. 

family  life  as  pure  and  full  of  love  as  in  a 
Christian  home  in  America ;  woman  has  not 
only  been  lifted  from  a  life  of  slavery  to 
liberty,  but  the  estimation  in  which  she  is 
held  has  been  notably  raised.  Every  phase 
of  social  and  business  life  has  been  changed 
by  Him  who  makes  all  things  new,  so  that 
it  is  possible  to  pick  out  the  Christian  Chi- 
nese by  the  looks  of  their  faces. 

3.  Forces  have  been  set  at  work  by  Chris- 
tianity which  are  not  directly  connected  with 
the  Christian  Church.  Infanticide,  once  so 
common  in  China,  is  now  practically  non- 
existent. A  large  society  has  been  organ- 
ized the  object  of  which  is  to  stop  the 
barbarous  practice  of  foot-binding.  Ten 
thousand  heathen  Chinese  gentlemen  have 
pledged  themselves  never  to  have  their 
daughters'  feet  bound,  or  to  marry  their  sons 
to  girls  with  bound  feet.  Schools  are  being 
established  of  every  grade  from  the  pri- 
mary to  the  university.     A  desire  for  rail- 

56 


China. 

roads,  telegraphs,  post  offices,  and  other  im- 
provements, all  of  which  are  helps  to  the 
progress  of  Christianity  as  well  as  results 
of  Christianity,  is  manifest  all  over  the  land. 

II.    Opportunities. 

I.  For  Evangelistic  Work. — China  has  a 
population  of  406,000,000,  that,  in  spite  of 
differences  of  dialect  and  customs,  are  prac- 
tically a  homogeneous  people.  China  has 
been  held  together  during  the  centuries,  not 
by  despotism  or  by  force  of  arms,  but  by  the 
essential  oneness  of  the  people.  And  this 
immense  population  is  now  open  to  evan- 
gelization. Ten  years  ago  there  were  nine 
hundred  walled  cities  of  China  and  five 
whole  provinces  that  were  closed  to  the  mis- 
sionary. Now  every  province  has  been 
opened,  and  the  gates  of  every  city  swing 
wide  open  to  the  messengers  of  Christ. 

In  a  city  less  than  two  hundred  miles 
from  Foochow,  whence  three  times  in  the 

,57 


The  Asiatic  Fiei^ds. 

last  ten  years  missionaries  have  had  to  flee 
for  their  lives,  and  twice  have  hidden  under 
the  tiles  of  the  roof,  I  have  myself  within 
the  past  six  months  been  welcomed  by  citi- 
zen and  official  alike.  In  the  very  center  of 
this  city  are  three  beautiful  hills,  which 
command  a  view  not  only  of  the  whole  city 
but  of  the  entire  surrounding  country.  On 
one  of  these  hills  is  the  newly  built  residence 
of  our  Methodist  missionary,  and  by  its  side 
the  Yenping  Academy  is  in  process  of  erec- 
tion. On  the  second  hill  the  Alden  Speare 
Memorial  Hospital  is  soon  to  be  built,  and 
we  hope  the  Girls'  and  Women's  School 
will  occupy  the  third.  Just  in  front  of  all 
three  is  being  built  a  large  church  the  money 
for  which  was  largely  raised  among  the  Chi- 
nese themselves.  Everywhere  doors  are 
opened  for  the  messengers  of  the  Gospel  of 
peace. 

2.  For  Bdiicational  Work. — The  greatest 
need  of  China  to-day  is  education,  and  the 

58 


China. 

Chinese  people  are  looking  to  the  Christian 
Church  for  help  in  this  respect.  The  efforts 
of  the  Chinese  government  to  establish 
Confucian  schools  is  an  evidence  on  the  one 
hand  of  the  widespread  desire  for  education, 
and  on  the  other  a  tacit  acknowledgment  of 
the  influence  of  the  Christian  schools.  Open 
opposition  to  Christianity  died  with  the 
Boxer  movement,  but  a  silent,  subtle  death- 
struggle  has  been  begun  in  the  schools.  The 
government  wants  Confucian  schools,  the 
people  want  Christian  schools.  In  the  city 
of  Foochow  are  three  government  schools, 
well  supported  and  fairly  well  equipped. 
Students  are  supported  while  in  school  and 
are  assured  of  good  positions  when  they 
finish.  In  the  Anglo-Chinese  College,  just 
outside  the  city,  students  have  to  pay  all  their 
expenses.  In  the  three  Confucian  schools, 
where  students  are  paid  to  attend  and  posi- 
tions provided  for  them,  there  were  last 
term  less  than  one  hundred  and  fifty  stu- 

59 


The  Asiatic  Fiei^ds. 

dents  enrolled.  In  the  one  Christian  school, 
where  students  have  to  pay  to  come  and  no 
positions  are  assured,  three  hundred  and 
thirty-six  were  enrolled.  Many  of  these 
boys  are  heathen  when  they  come.  Said  a 
heathen  gentleman  to  me  not  long  ago,  "Mr. 
Simester,  do  you  know  why  I  send  my  boys 
to  your  school?"  ''No,"  replied  I,  "but  I 
suppose  you  send  them  to  get  an  education." 
"No,  I  don't,"  said  he,  "I  send  them  for  the 
moral  training  they  get."  Think  of  it! 
heathen  gentlemen  sending  their  boys  to 
Christian  schools  to  secure  their  moral  train- 
ing! Our  intermediate  schools  are  full  all 
the  time,  and  there  is  opportunity  for  twice 
as  many  with  increased  facilities.  From 
thousands  of  cities  and  villages  come  calls 
for  day  schools,  and  the  only  limit  to  the 
number  of  these  schools  we  might  open  is 
the  number  of  trained  native  teachers.  If 
the  Church  would  improve  the  opportunity 

she  might  have  the  educating  of  the  larger 

60 


China. 

part  of  China's  young  people.  As  go  the 
schools  of  this  generation,  so  will  go  the 
business,  social,  and  national  life  of  the  next. 

3.  For  Hospitals  and  Charitable  Work. — 
Innumerable  cases  of  disease,  beyond  the 
skill  of  Chinese  physicians,  are  met  on  every 
hand.  Our  hospitals  are  all  full,  and  our 
physicians  overworked.  Christ  went  every- 
where healing  them  that  were  sick.  More 
hospitals  and  more  physicians  could  be  util- 
ized at  once.  There  are  thousands  of  home- 
less children  that  might  be  brought  up  in 
the  nurture  and  admonition  of  the  Lord  if 
we  had  orphanages  and  helpers  enough  to 
care  for  them.  The  blind  are  asking  to  be 
taught  to  read  and  to  work ;  widows  by  the 
hundred  are  asking  for  help ;  whole  colonies 
of  lepers  need  to  be  cared  for.  For  all  these 
needs  China  appeals  to  the  Christian  Church. 

4.  For  Publishing  Houses. — Not  only  has 
the  press  been  an  important  factor  in  the 
results  already  achieved,  but  its  place  in  the 

61 


The:  Asiatic  Fie;i,ds. 

work  cannot  fail  to  be  more  and  more  im- 
portant. Christian  books  and  literature  are 
in  great  demand.  A  heathen  viceroy  re- 
cently ordered  thousands  of  dollars'  worth 
of  Christian  books  from  Shanghai.  The 
Christian  presses  have  contracts  for  work 
for  years  ahead. 

5.  For  Work  Among  Women. — One  of 
the  greatest  opportunities  lies  in  the  work 
for  women  and  girls.  Husbands  who  do 
not  care  to  talk  about  Christianity  them- 
selves are  perfectly  willing  to  have  mission- 
ary women  talk  to  their  wives.  Fathers 
who  send  their  sons  to  a  Confucian  school 
send  their  daughters  to  a  Christian  semi- 
nary. The  average  Chinaman  thinks  it 
makes  little  difference  what  a  woman  be- 
lieves, but  we  know  that  the  most  eft'ective 
individual  factor  in  Christianity  is  the  Chris- 
tian woman. 

Let  the  Church  not  stand  on  what  it  has 
done,  but  go  forward,  entering  every  one 

62 


China. 

of  these  open  doors,  and  that  with  a  force 
large  enough  and  efficient  enough  to  bring 
this  land  to  God. 

Numerically,  intellectually,  and  morally 
this  people  is  the  greatest  in  the  heathen 
world.  They  tell  us  that  in  South  Africa 
there  is  a  road  constructed  from  the  rubbish 
taken  from  the  Kimberley  mines.  Now  the 
road  is  being  dug  up,  for  it  has  been  found  to 
be  full  of  diamonds.  That  the  surface  of 
China  is  covered  with  the  filthy  accretions 
of  centuries  of  stagnation  and  sin  is  appar- 
ent to  all,  but  at  the  bottom  of  this  filth 
missionaries  have  found  streets  paved  with 
gold. 

They  tell  us  that  China  has  been  asleep 
for  four  thousand  years  and  that  her  civil- 
ization now  should  be  compared  with  Euro- 
pean civilization  in  the  sixteenth  century. 
A  nation  that  could  sleep  four  thousand 
years  and  wake  up  only  four  hundred  years 
behind  civilized  America  is  worth  saving. 

63 


The:  Asiatic  Fiki^ds. 

The  old  Chinese  junk  is  covered  with 
barnacles,  but  scrape  these  off,  cover  the 
outside  with  a  coat  of  modern  civilization, 
and  in  place  of  the  old  square  sails  that  have 
driven  the  ship  whithersoever  the  wind  listed 
put  the  dynamic  power  of  the  Gospel  of 
Jesus  Christ,  and  you  will  have  a  ship  that 
can  take  its  place  by  the  side  of  any  the 
world  has  ever  seen. 

China  aroused  and  enlightened  and  filled 
with  the  Holy  Ghost  would  sweep  through 
the  coming  centuries  with  an  impetus  and 
glory  impossible  to  conceive. 

64 


IV. 

SUCCESSES   AND    OPPORTU- 
NITIES IN  KOREA. 

By  REV.   GEORGE  HEBER  JONES,  Ph.D. 

Twdnty-five:  years  ago  Korea  was  an 
unknown  land.  It  had  its  place  on  the  map, 
but  its  coasts  were  unsurveyed,  its  rivers 
unexplored  and  the  names  of  its  cities  un- 
known. No  treaties  with  Christian  nations 
existed.  No  commerce  brought  wealth  to 
the  people,  no  travelers  visited  the  country. 
And  the  outside  world  was  equally  un- 
known to  the  Korean.  He  had  heard  of 
the  white  man,  and  even  seen  a  few  speci- 
mens of  that  race,  most  of  whom  he  had 
promptly   killed   and   thrown   to   the   dogs 

S  65 


The;  Asiatic  Fipxds. 

and  ravens  to  eat.  He  had  seen  enough  to 
convince  him  that  the  white  man  was  a 
wild,  thieving  savage,  whose  language 
sounded  like  the  twittering  of  sparrows  and 
the  chatterings  of  magpies,  whose  customs 
and  ideas  were  immoral  and  blasphemous, 
whose  costume  and  appearance  was  dia- 
bolical, and  whose  religion  was  the  sum  of 
all  villainies. 

This  was  the  Korean's  idea  of  the  white 
man,  written  in  his  laws  and  literature  and 
deep  grained  in  his  nature.  Two  short 
decades  ago  America  led  the  way  in  open- 
ing up  Korea  diplomatically,  and  Christian 
missions  immediately  followed  to  put  to  an 
end  forever  such  conditions  as  I  have  de- 
scribed; and  in  the  van  commanding  one 
wing  of  the  advance  guard  was  our  own 
Methodist  Church.  Missionaries  were  sent 
to  found  the  work,  and  what  a  task  con- 
fronted them ! 

They  had  to  wrest  from  a  pagan  govern- 
66. 


KOR^A. 

merit  and  an  antagonistic  populace  the  right 
to  reside  within  the  borders  of  the  land,  to 
travel,  study,  teach,  and  convert;  they  had 
to  face  the  peril  and  danger  of  the  plague 
and  pestilence,  the  sea,  the  mountains  and 
lonely  places,  the  mob,  robbers,  wild  beasts, 
and  savage  men.  Tliey  had  to  master  a 
barbarous  tongue  and  make  it  the  servitor 
of  Christ,  a  language  so  perverse  that  one 
has  said  he  doubted  if  a  man  could  speak 
the  truth  with  it.  They  had  to  stand  firm 
and  unflinching  amid  the  loneliness  and 
desolation  of  their  situation.  They  did  it. 
They  built  over  against  the  institutions  of 
heathenism  the  institutions  of  Christ.  They 
set  up  the  altar  of  the  true  God  in  the  midst 
of  the  myriad  altars  of  false  gods;  they 
cried  forth  into  the  noise,  confusion,  and 
babble  of  false  ideas  and  wild  superstitions 
the  eternal  truth  of  God  in  Christ  Jesus; 
and  in  eighteen  years  the  prejudices  and 
antagonism  of  ten  millions  of  people  three 

67 


Th^  Asiatic  Fiej.ds. 

thousand  years  deep  in  their  heathenism 
have  been  conquered,  and  in  their  place 
friendly  relations  established.  I  submit 
that  were  this  all  we  had  to  show  it  would 
be  enough  for  the  first  eighteen  years 
of  labor. 

Vantage  Points  Gained. 

But  not  only  have  we  secured  for  our- 
selves the  right  to  work,  but  a  revolution 
has  been  established  in  the  thought  and 
attitude  of  the  people  toward  Christ  such 
as  has  taken  centuries  to  produce  in  other 
lands.  Christianity  has  been  vindicated 
from  the  base  calumnies  with  which  it  was 
slandered.  The  laws  in  the  penal  code 
which  denounce  death  to  all  who  embrace 
our  religion  have  been  rendered  a  dead  let- 
ter. From  looking  upon  it  as  a  religion  fit 
only  for  barbarians  and  savages,  the  lordly 
Confucianist  cries  out  in  amazement,  ''Your 
Christ  is  as  great  as  our  Sage!"     One  of 

68 


KORKA. 

the  most  honored  and  ablest  statesman  of 
Korea  said  to  me :  "Go  on  with  your  teach- 
ing; Christianity  is  destined  shortly  to  be 
Korea's  religion.  For  three  hundred  years 
our  land  has  not  produced  a  really  great 
expounder  or  exemplifier  of  the  Confu- 
cian cult.  We  possess  only  the  shadow 
of  it.  We  are  a  land  without  rehgion, 
and  Christianity  must  be  accepted  by 
us." 

It  rests  with  us  to  say  whether  Chris- 
tianity, when  it  is  accepted  by  Korea,  shall 
be  Roman  and  sacramental,  or  evangelical 
and  biblical  in  form.  The  attitude  of  the 
people  has  changed.  Though  they  perse- 
cute and  oppose  our  converts,  they  do  it, 
not  because  they  think  Christianity  bad,  but 
because  they  look  upon  our  converts  as 
traitors  to  their  ancestors.  They  know 
Christianity  is  good.  They  expect  its  final 
triumph.  Their  attitude  is  one  of  antici- 
pation. 

69 


The:  Asiatic  Fie:i.ds. 

The;  Church  Founde:d. 

The  foundations  were  laid  when  our 
Lord  Christ  shed  his  blood  on  Calvary's 
brow  and  opened  to  Koreans  the  gates  of 
life.  They  were  laid  when  God's  Spirit 
moved  his  servants  in  America  to  send  to 
Korea  the  banner  of  the  world-conquering 
cross.  In  the  human  and  temporal  sense 
they  have  been  deeply,  solemnly  laid  during 
the  past  two  decades.  From  among  that 
populace  with  many  a  Saul  breathing  out 
threatenings  and  slaughter  against  Christ 
there  have  come  Pauls  who  have  become 
glorious  workmen  for  Christ,  building  up 
his  kingdom  throughout  the  Korean  empire. 
Fifteen  years  ago  we  reported  our  first 
membership — thirty-eight  converts.  To- 
day a  host  of  seven  thousand  Methodists 
are  enrolled  in  our  churches,  eager,  earnest, 
and  consecrated,  and  at  their  head  stand 
four  ordained  ministers  of  the  Gospel. 

70 


Kore:a. 

The;  Bible  and  Prayer  Have  the  Right 
OF  Way. 

The  Korean  Church  is  a  Bible-loving 
Church.  Most  of  our  male  converts  and  a 
large  percentage  of  the  women  can  read.  I 
once  met  an  old  man  who  had  been  con- 
verted at  the  age  of  seventy-two  years. 
The  frequent  services  through  the  week 
did  not  satisfy  him.  His  heart  was  so  full 
of  love  for  God's  word  that  he  wished  to 
read  it  for  himself.  He  was  ignorant  of 
letters,  yet  at  that  advanced  age  this  old 
man  learned  to  read  in  order  that  he  might 
be  able  to  see  for  himself  the  glories  of  God 
in  his  word.  .  Another  old  man  named 
Matthew  Yi  was  known  never  to  be  without 
a  copy  of  the  Bible  in  his  hand,  except 
when  eating  or  sleeping.  Our  people  love 
the  Bible. 

Wherever  in  the  world  you  find  the  Bible 
loved  and  honored,  there  you  will  find  the 

71 


Th5  Asiatic  Fiki^ds. 

family  altar  also,  and  so  it  is  with  the  Ko- 
rean. As  a  heathen  he  is,  as  Paul  said  of 
the  Athenians,  ^'too  religious."  Before  the 
light  of  Christ  dispels  his  darkness,  he  peo- 
ples his  home  with  specter  demons.  They 
perch  on  the  beams  and  nest  in  the  ceiling 
and  walls ;  they  enshrine  themselves  in  the 
parlor,  the  kitchen,  and  the  shed ;  they  hide 
in  the  floor  and  the  chimney.  The  Korean 
without  Christ  spends  his  life  amid  these 
death-shadows. 

But  the  Christian  Korean  erects  in  his 
home  the  family  altar,  and  the  darkness 
and  gloom  vanish,  the  dead  shadows 
flee  away,  and  in  their  train  go  many  a 
superstition,  many  a  cruel  practice.  The 
family  altar  stands  for  a  Christian  home, 
and  a  Christian  home  means  love,  sympa- 
thy, and  cooperation.  It  means  wife  raised 
from  the  position  of  a  servant  and  toy  to 
that  of  a  helpmeet  and  companion.  It 
means  one  wife  and  purity,  not  many  wives 

72 


Kore:a. 

and  debauchery.  To-day  in  thousands  of 
homes  in  the  valleys  and  on  the  hill-slopes 
of  Korea  there  are  family  altars  where 
husband  and  wife  and  children  gather  in 
daily  prayer  for  divine  grace  and  guidance, 
and  a  heavenly  Shekinah  shines  forth  and 
changes  a  mud  hut  into  a  temple  to  the 
only  living  and  eternal  God. 

The;  Kore;an  Church  an  Active 
Church. 

From  the  very  first  the  convert  is  more 
than  a  church  member,  he  is  a  worker  for 
Christ.  He  may  be  only  an  ignorant,  un- 
tutored, uncouth  farmer,  but  he  knows  and 
possesses  something  his  neighbors  have  not, 
and  he  presses  it  home  on  them.  There  is 
an  impulse  within  him  to  work  for  Christ. 
His  soul  is  energized  with  new  and  glorious 
forces.  He  would  not  keep  silent  if  he 
could,  and  he  could  not  if  he  would.  His 
heathen  neighbors  will  not  permit  him  to 

7Z 


Th^  Asiatic  Fii-i^ds. 

remain  inactive.  From  the  day  he  pubHcly 
renounces  heathenism  by  burning  his  fe- 
tiches and  idols  on  the  plot  in  front  of  his 
house,  he  is  a  marked  man.  His  neighbors 
attack  him  and  his  new  beliefs,  and  he 
must  defend  them  and  prove  their  truth, 
or  surrender  at  discretion  and  go  back  to 
heathenism.  He  is  strengthened  by  this 
process,  and  his  testimony  to  his  neighbors 
backed  up  by  a  changed  life  is  powerful, 
because  he  speaks  in  the  language  and  ideas 
with  which  they  are  familiar.  Thus 
through  this  one  man  Christianity  obtains  a 
foothold  in  some  heathen  village;  a  few 
others  join  with  this  first  convert ;  they 
grow  in  grace,  knowledge,  and  numbers. 
The  first  convert  is  recognized  by  the  mis- 
sionary as  the  class  leader.  Some  baptisms 
take  place.  By  the  time  their  numbers  reach 
twelve  or  fifteen  families  they  put  up  a 
building  especially  for  worship.  It  is  not 
very  beautiful  in  architecture  or  material. 

74 


Kore:a. 

Like  the  houses  of  the  behevers,  it  may 
have  mud  walls  and  thatched  roofs  and 
paper  windows,  but  it  is  their  church !  And 
I  will  tell  you  one  thing  about  it.  It  is 
always  just  a  little  better  than  the  houses 
of  the  converts.  It  is  consecrated  to  God, 
and  here  they  worship,  and  who  shall  say  it 
is  not  as  precious  and  beautiful  in  the  eyes 
of  the  all-seeing  Father  as  the  costliest  fane 
ever  erected  by  the  poured-out  treasure  of 
Christendom  ? 

From  an  Ox  to  a  Chicken. 

And  what  is  the  result?  Heathenism 
vanishes  away.  Dr.  Noble  tells  of  a  hamlet 
of  sixty  families  where  we  got  a  footing, 
and  in  the  course  of  a  short  time  forty 
families  became  Christians.  Previously 
they  had  a  yearly  sacrifice  to  the  demons  in 
which  an  ox  was  offered.  But  this  year 
Christianity  had  made  such  inroads  on  the 
numbers  of  the  non-Christian  populace  that 

75 


The:  Asiatic  Fiii:i.DS. 

those  who  remained  contented  themselves 
with  offering  a  chicken  to  the  gods !  Do 
you  ask  me  what  is  the  result  of  our  work  ? 
You  see  it  in  the  fact  that  the  sacrifices  of 
heathenism  are  dwindling  from  an  ox  to  a 
chicken. 

The  work  in  these  villages  is  built  up 
and  conserved  by  the  native  converts. 
Never  has  there  been  a  time  in  the  history  of 
the  w^ork  in  Korea  when  there  have  been 
enough  white  men  properly  to  shepherd 
God's  Church  there.  Our  native  converts 
have  done  this  as  well  as  they  could.  They 
have  served  without  pay  of  any  kind,  work- 
ing on  their  farms  throughout  the  week  like 
the  other  Christians,  but  keeping  the  lamp 
of  God  burning. 

A  Spirit-:^ii.i.ed  Church. 

Whence  comes  the  power  of  these  Ko- 
rean farmers  to  stand  firm  against  all  the 
forces  that  a  trained  and  intellectual  pagan- 

7i> 


KORKA. 

ism  can  bring  to  bear  upon  them?  Whence 
comes  their  power  to  overcome  the  false 
ideas  and  debased  practices  in  their  own 
hearts,  their  homes,  and  their  hamlets? 
Whence  comes  their  power  to  meet  and 
vanquish  the  skilled  intellectual  forces  of 
Confucianism?  Whence  comes  their  power 
to  stand  unflinching  and  triumphant  amid 
the  fierce  furnace  fires  of  persecution  ?  One 
answer  alone  there  is.  It  is  the  Spirit  of 
God. 

There  is  not  a  man  in  our  Church  that 
has  not  suffered  in  his  body,  his  goods,  or 
his  soul  because  of  Christ.  Some  have  been 
cast  out  in  disgrace  by  relatives ;  children 
have  been  disinherited  by  parents,  and  par- 
ents abandoned  by  children ;  wives  have 
been  divorced  by  husbands  because  of 
Christ.  Some  have  lost  property  and  tem- 
poral prosperity.  Others  have  met  cruel 
beatings,  even  nigh  unto  death,  for  his 
sake. 

17 


The  Asiatic  Fie;i.ds. 

The:  Kore:an  Church  a  Self-supporting 
Church. 

The  Korean  Church  has  made  a  magnifi- 
cent record  in  self-support.  It  was  to  be 
expected.  A  Bible-loving,  active,  vv^orking. 
Spirit-filled,  persecuted  Church  must  do  its 
full  limit  in  self-support.  For  every  paid 
helper  we  have,  there  are  fifty  volunteer 
workers.  Chapels  are  built,  all  running  ex- 
penses paid,  visitation  to  outlying  classes 
maintained,  and  Christian  literature  bought 
and  distributed  out  of  the  funds  of  the  na- 
tive Church.  It  is  a  sight  to  see  a  worship- 
ing congregation  when  the  collection  is 
taken;  rarely  will  a  man  allow  the  plate  to 
pass  him  without  a  gift.  Beginning  in 
1894,  when  we  had  221  members,  our  Ko- 
rean Church  has  contributed  17,530  yen,  or 
over  $8,000,  for  the  work  of  the  Lord. 
How  much  this  sum  represents  in  God's 
arithmetic  I  will  not  venture  to  estimate. 

78 


Korea. 

This  is  some  little  part  of  the  story  of 
success  in  Korea.  I  will  not  speak  of  the 
wide-spreading  influence  of  our  Church  on 
the  national  life  and  character,  or  of  the 
indirect  successes  of  Christianity  in  the 
world  of  Korean  thought,  but  enough  has 
been  said  to  show  that  opposing  conditions 
have  been  met  and  conquered,  obstacles  sur- 
mounted, and  problems  solved.  The  Church 
of  Christ  has  been  established  with  its  foun- 
dation deep  in  the  bed  rock  of  national 
character.  We  are  weathering  all  storms 
of  persecution  and  forging  slowly  ahead,  in 
spite  of  the  fiercest  gales  blowing  from  the 
pit.  Our  story  is  an  uninterrupted  tale  of 
progress  and  success.  We  have  not  met 
with  a  reverse. 

The:  Opportunities  oi?  Christian  Mis- 
sions  IN    Korea. 

Light  begins  to  stream  in  on  Korea's 
darkness.    The  Eastern  horizon  is  breaking 

79 


Thk  Asiatic  Fields. 

into  smiles  with  the  glory  of  a  new  day. 
Christ  has  come,  and  Christ  is  the  light  of 
the  world.  Fair  indeed  is  the  vision  as  we 
look  out  upon  Christ's  triumphs  in  Korea. 
But  what  a  prospect  greets  us  as  we  catch 
a  glimpse  of  the  golden  day  of  opportunity 
in  Korea ! 

Territorially  Korea  lies  at  our  feet.  It 
has  been  visited,  explored,  and  mapped  out 
in  its  length  and  breadth.  Every  province 
and  the  larger  portion  of  the  three  hundred 
and  thirty-two  prefectures  which  constitute 
the  empire  have  been  visited  and  sown  with 
Christian  literature,  and  in  many  of  these 
prefectures  Christian  converts  reside  and 
work  for  the  Master.  The  distribution  and 
location  of  Christ's  forces  in  Korea  consti- 
tute an  opportunity  of  the  first  order. 

There  is  an  utter  absence  of  many  things 
which  serve  in  other  lands  as  serious  com- 
petitors with  Christianity.  In  Korea 
Christianity  is  the  only  thing  in  sight.     No 

80 


Korea. 

new  political  life,  calling  the  people  to  con- 
sider questions  of  communal  and  national 
welfare,  with  the  excitement  incidental  to 
local  and  other  elections,  breaks  in  on  the 
monotony  of  their  life.  No  expanding 
military  and  naval  development  appeals  to 
their  national  pride.  No  public  school  sys- 
tem with  its  multitudes  of  children  and 
youth  preparing  themselves  to  take  a  wor- 
thy part  in  the  affairs  of  life  gives 
hope  for  the  future.  No  large  industrial 
and  commercial  enterprises  under  native 
control  promise  relief  to  the  widespread 
poverty  of  the  Korean  people.  And  last 
and  most  important  of  all,  the  black  curse 
of  a  skeptical,  infidel,  impure  literature  has 
not  yet  found  expression  in  the  Korean 
language.  As  far  as  the  life  of  the  populace 
is  concerned,  it  remains  unchanged  and  un- 
disturbed. The  only  new  thing  that  breaks 
in  on  Korean  quietude  is  Christianity.  It 
alone  speaks  of  a  promise  of  improvement 
6  8i 


The  Asiatic  Fiei^ds. 

in  communal  and  national  conditions ;  it 
alone  affords  a  hope  of  safety  and  security 
to  the  nation;  it  alone  has  an  organized 
school  system.  The  two  secular  newspapers 
published  under  native  auspices  are  favor- 
able to  Christianity.  The  only  weekly 
published  in  the  land  is  the  organ  of  the 
Presbyterian  Church.  The  only  magazine 
published  is  the  organ  of  the  Methodist 
Episcopal  Church.  The  only  literature 
to-day  is  that  which  comes  forth  from 
Christian  sources.  The  two  best  selling 
books  in  Korea  are  the  Christian  Bible  and 
hymn  book.  Therefore,  I  repeat  it,  Chris- 
tianity is  the  only  thing  in  sight.  From  the 
vantage  point  of  this  opportunity  we  can 
reach  and  influence  the  nation  with  excep- 
tional power.  How  long  this  will  continue 
to  be  the  case  wc  cannot  say,  for  the  devil 
is  not  yet  dead.  But  while  the  opportunity 
lasts  it  should  be  improved  to  the  utmost 

limit  of  possibility. 

82 


Kore:a. 

The;  Conditions  Among  the  Peopi^e:  at 
Large:  an  Opportunity. 

Tourists  tell  us  that  two  things  in  Korea 
strike  them  very  forcibly :  The  pitiable 
condition  to  which  the  people  have  been 
reduced,  and  the  amazing  success  of  Chris- 
tian missions.  Korea's  need,  nor  man,  nor 
angel,  nor  seraph  can  adequately  describe. 
Only  the  heart  of  the  Eternal,  who,  from 
the  depths  of  his  holiness  measures  so  accu- 
rately all  moral  conditions,  can  know  the 
depth  of  Korea's  ruin  and  desolation.  Op- 
pression is  there  in  ''cruel,  man-destroying 
power,  that  ravages  kingdoms  and  lays  em- 
pires waste  and  in  pitiless  wantonness  thins 
states  of  half  their  people  and  gives  up  the 
rest  to  want."  Oppression  blights  every 
budding  promise  of  good.  Vice  is  there 
paralyzing  and  destroying  the  life  of 
the  people.  The  typical  Korean  looks 
out    on    the    world    with    the    sense    that 

83 


The:  Asiatic  Fieilds. 

the  best  things  are  gone.  Purity  and 
innocence,  hope,  Hfe,  and  God  are  gone; 
and  gone  are  those  things  which  make  for 
righteousness  and  truth,  that  in  Christian 
lands  are  enjoyed  in  such  lavish  bounty 
that  many  ignore  and  even  trample  them 
under  feet.  Unknown  are  those  priceless 
privileges  of  the  Christian  Church  and  her 
services  and  influences  that  pervade  the 
air  we  breathe,  that  follow  us  from  cradle 
to  grave.  The  Korean  stands  and  searches 
far  and  wide  over  the  desolate,  gloomy 
wastes  of  his  civilization  for  all  these  things, 
but  they  are  gone. 

A  short  time  ago  I  was  walking  with  a 
young  Korean  man,  a  patriot  concerned 
for  the  welfare  of  his  people.  He  said  to 
me:  "We  look  out  into  the  future  and  see 
no  ray  of  light.  The  night  about  us  is  deep 
and  dark  and  cold.  The  hearts  of  my  peo- 
ple are  frost-bitten."  Aye !  that  is  it,  frost- 
bitten by  the  dark,  arctic  night  of  heathen- 

84 


KOR^A. 

ism !  Into  conditions  like  these  comes  the 
story  of  the  Gospel  with  its  promise  of  help, 
of  better  things,  of  a  brighter  day.  Christ 
has  seen  the  opportunity  these  conditions 
offer,  and  he  is  there  in  Korea  to-day : 
sometimes  beside  the  lonely  missionary, 
cheering  and  strengthening  him;  some- 
times with  a  persecuted  Christian  in  his 
home,  in  prison,  or  in  the  death  cell,  even 
as  he  was  present  with  his  saints  of  old  in 
the  seven  times  heated  fiery  furnace ;  again, 
in  the  depths  of  the  conflict  with  the  forces 
of  sin  and  darkness.  We  behold  his  form, 
we  see  his  pierced  hand  as  it  beckons  us  on 
to  higher  endeavor  and  nobler  achievement. 
Shall  we  lag  behind?     God  forbid  it! 

Opportunities  in  the:  Native  Church. 

Equal  with  these  opportunities  that 
promise  such  large  reward  is  the  opportu- 
nity which  lies  before  us  in  the  native 
Church.     Here  we  have  a  compact,  enthu- 

85 


The:  Asiatic  Fiklds. 

slastic,  earnest  body  of  men.  Soldiers  they 
are  in  their  frame  of  mind  where  the  forces 
of  sin  are  concerned,  filled  with  the  Spirit 
of  God,  purified  by  persecution  and  armed 
with  divine  truth.  They  ask,  first  of  all, 
that  we  shall  give  to  them  in  its  entirety 
that  sacred  body  of  truth  which  has  come 
down  to  us  from  our  fathers,  and  which 
we  are  proud  to  pass  on  to  other  nations 
and  coming  generations.  The  Korean 
Christians  desire  to  be  more  than  Christians 
in  name,  they  call  for  and  demand  the  sub- 
stance of  Christianity.  They  desire  to  be 
saved  from  the  fate  that  overtook  Coptic 
and  Abyssinian  Christianity.  The  supreme 
obligation,  the  great  task  which  confronts 
us  to-day,  recognized  no  less  fully  by  the 
native  Church  than  by  the  missionaries, 
is  the  great  need  of  indoctrination.  These 
men  who  have  come  from  the  rice  swamps 
and    barley    fields,    from    the    merchants' 

thoroughfares   and   the   teacher's   mat    de- 

86 


KOREJA. 

mand  that  we  should  teach  them,  drill  them, 
give  them  Christianity  in  its  entirety. 

And  they  ask  us  for  leadership.  In  our 
native  Church  race  prejudice  has  not  as 
yet  lifted  its  ugly  head.  The  native  Chris- 
tians respect  and  honor  their  white  broth- 
ers. They  look  upon  them  as  carrying  in 
themselves  the  highest  attainments  and  the 
largest  amount  of  force  possible  from 
Christian  experience.  They  believe  in  them 
as  captains  and  leaders,  and  for  this  gener- 
ation and  the  generation  to  come  they  turn 
their  eyes  and  their  hearts  lovingly  and  ex- 
pectingly  to  the  overflowing  camps  of 
Christendom  in  search  for  that  consecrated 
leadership  which  shall  guide  them  to  final 
and  complete  triumph  in  their  land.  They 
are  full  of  courage;  there  is  no  intrench- 
ment  of  the  foe  they  will  hesitate  to  storm; 
there  is  no  point  in  the  conflict  so  perilous 
but  they  will  gladly  thrust  themselves  into 
it  in  order  to  pluck  victory  for  Jesus  Christ. 

87 


The;  Asiatic  Fidi^ds. 

Give  them,  then,  what  they  need  in  this 
their  day  of  desire,  reaHzing  that  upon  our 
action  at  this  time  hangs  the  whole  future 
of  the  Church  of  Korea. 

Plea  i^or  a  Strong  Advance. 

The  golden  day  of  God's  opportunity  is 
upon  us  in  Korea.  Let  us  not  sin  it  away 
in  idleness. 

The  busy  world  shoves  angrily  aside 

The  man  who  stands  with  arms  akimbo  set 

Until  occasion  tell  him  what  to  do. 

And  he  who  waits  to  have  his  task  marked  out 

Shall  die  and  leave  his  errand  unfulfilled. 

I  plead  on  behalf  of  ten  millions  of  souls 
now  slowly  beginning  to  turn  their  eyes  to 
"the  Light  of  the  world."  I  plead  on  behalf 
of  a  youthful  Church,  eager,  curious,  anx- 
ious, ready  for  the  fray,  and  asking  only 
for  sufficient  and  efficient  leadership.  I 
plead  that  our  great  Church  may  begin 
seriously,  and  in  a  manner  commensurate 

88 


Korea. 

with  her  vast  resources,  the  work  of  evan- 
gelizing Korea.  For  I  dare  afifirm  that, 
moving  forward  from  the  vantage  ground 
of  past  success,  along  the  lines  of  our  mag- 
nificent opportunities,  the  end  is  already 
looming  in  sight  on  the  far  horizon  of 
Korea. 

89 


V. 

SUCCESSES    AND    OPPORTU- 
NITIES IN  JAPAN. 

By  REV.   DAVID  S.   SPENCER,  D.D. 

The:  first  Protestant  missionaries  entered 
Japan  in  1859.  Their  first  convert  received 
baptism  in  October,  1864,  but  so  hostile  was 
the  government  to  the  foreigner  and  his 
hated  yasu-kyo  that  up  to  1873  but  some 
eleven  Japanese  had  received  baptism  into 
the  Protestant  faith. 

These  were  times  of  suspicion  and  dark 
deeds.  Notice-boards  prohibiting  faith  in 
Christianity  and  offering  rewards  for  ex- 
posing native  believers  were  posted  by  the 
government  in  public  places.  For  the  mis- 
sionary to  leave  his  home  at  night  was  posi- 

90 


Japan. 

lively  unsafe.  While  policemen  guarded  his 
person  and  property,  because  of  the  govern- 
ment's treaty  obligations,  her  secret  detect- 
ives dogged  his  footsteps.  If  the  common 
people  were  inclined  to  receive  the  foreigner, 
his  religion,  his  schools,  the  attitude  of  their 
leaders  forbade  it.  It  needed  a  dozen  years 
to  allay  suspicion,  to  show  the  difference 
between  Protestantism  and  Romanism,  and 
to  prepare  the  way  for  any  direct  work. 

These  are  briefly  the  conditions  our  he- 
roic pioneer  missionaries  met  when  they  or- 
ganized our  Methodist  Episcopal  Mission, 
August  8,  1873.  Without  a  dwelling  house, 
a  church,  or  a  native  convert,  with  no 
knowledge  of  the  language,  no  Christian 
literature,  no  helps  of  any  kind;  but  with 
God  above,  the  love  of  Christ  in  their  hearts, 
a  praying  Church  behind  them,  and  a  hand- 
ful of  sympathetic  missionaries  like  them- 
selves about  them,  they  began  to  lay  the 
foundation  of  our  Church  in  that  land. 

9I) 


The:  Asiatic  Fiei^ds. 

Successes  of  Thirty  Years. 

What  are  the  successes  of  thirty  years 
of  toil?  We  now  have  sixty  native 
ordained  ministers,  trained  in  our  schools, 
loyal  to  our  cause,  earnest,  intelligent, 
self-sacrificing,  able  to  double  or  quad- 
ruple their  income  any  day  by  taking 
secular  work  or  government  positions;  as 
preachers  and  evangelists  second  to  none  in 
any  Church.  We  have  thirty-four  under- 
graduate men  coming  on  to  help  them.  We 
have  fifty-three  Bible  women  who  labor  for 
the  saving  of  the  women  of  Japan.  There 
are  seventy-seven  church  buildings  which 
invite  our  people  to  worship,  and  we  reg- 
ularly preach  the  Gospel  in  132  places.  God 
has  given  us  7,000  Church  members.  We 
gather  7,000  children  in  145  Sunday 
schools,  and  those  children  are  the  hope  of 
the  Church.  Our  boarding  schools  number 
eleven,  with  1,700  young  men  and  women  in 

92 


Japan. 

them,  about  eighty  per  cent  of  whom  be- 
come Christians  before  they  leave  our  halls, 
and  already  the  children  of  our  graduates 
are  coming  back  to  our  schools.  Our  Pub- 
lishing House  last  year  sent  out  700,000  vol- 
umes of  books  and  tracts,  or  10,000,000 
pages  of  Christian  literature,  all  over  the 
land.  We  have  seven  self-supporting 
churches,  and  last  year  our  people  gave  4.30 
yen  ($2.15)  a  member  for  self-support, 
which,  considering  the  circumstances  of  the 
givers,  is  not  excelled  by  the  Methodists  of 
these  United  States.  While  Methodism  en- 
tered the  field  the  last  of  the  five  largest 
families  of  Protestantism,  it  leads  them  all 
in  self-support  and  in  membership. 

This  is  a  very  brief  statistical  putting  of 
our  success  as  a  Church,  but  it  by  no  means 
tells  all  the  truth.  The  broader  influences 
of  Christian  civilization  upon  the  Japanese 
nation,  in  which  the  Methodist  Episcopal 
Church  has  borne  a  worthy  part,  must  never 

93 


The  Asiatic  Fie:i,ds. 

be  forgotten.  Instead  of  the  notice-boards 
which  in  the  beginning  forbade  the  Japanese 
to  beheve  in  Christianity,  the  Twenty-fifth 
Article  of  the  national  constitution  now 
guarantees  to  every  Japanese  subject  the 
enjoyment  of  freedom  of  religious  belief. 
Then  the  Christian  religion  was  a  hated  and 
condemned  foreign  creed,  an  alien  and  ille- 
gal ;  now  Christianity  has  the  same  legal 
status  as  Buddhism,  and  is  protected  by  the 
highest  law  of  the  empire. 

For  long  years  the  question  of  the 
Church's  property  in  Japan  was  one  of  se- 
rious concern,  as  there  were  no  provisions 
by  which  a  satisfactory  title  to  such  prop- 
erty could  be  had  in  the  name  of  the  Church, 
or  of  a  foreign  person,  company  or  corpora- 
tion ;  now  the  Church  property  may  be  held 
under  legal  provisions  as  safe  as  the  empire 
itself. 

Our  Mission  schools  have  long  labored 
under  great  embarrassment,  partly  because 

94 


Japan. 

they  were  Christian,  partly  because  they 
were  private  schools  rather  than  a  part  of 
the  government  school  system ;  but  recently 
the    chief    hindrances  have  been  removed. 

Con^idknce:  Re:stori:d. 

Suspicion  has  given  place  to  confidence, 
and  it  has  come  to  pass  that  the  men  most 
largely  trusted  are  the  Christian  men.  The 
president  in  the  lower  house  in  the  Diet, 
thrice  chosen,  is  a  Christian  man,  and  a 
dozen  or  fifteen  of  its  most  influential  mem- 
bers are  well-known  followers  of  Christ. 
This  is  about  fifty  times  the  due  representa- 
tion of  the  Christians  proportionate  to  mem- 
bers. But  we  now  have  Christian  ministers 
in  the  Cabinet,  Christian  admirals  in  the 
navy,  Christian  generals  in  the  army,  Chris- 
tian justices  upon  the  supreme  bench.  Chris- 
tian men  heading  important  commercial  en- 
terprises ;  and  we  ought  to  thank  God  that 
the  profession  of  Christianity  is  no  longer 

95 


The;  Asiatic  Fie:i,ds. 

a  bar  to  a  man's  attainment  of  the  highest 
positions  in  the  empire. 

Humanitarian  Se;rvice:. 

The  followers  of  Buddha  and  Confucius 
mumbled  pretty  ethical  phrases  about  kind- 
ness and  charity,  and  left  the  suffering  to 
bear  their  sorrows  as  best  they  might;  but 
the  Christians  are  dotting  the  land  with 
hospitals,  orphanages,  asylums,  homes  for 
the  friendless  and  for  ex-convicts,  and  the 
tears  of  joy  and  gratitude  that  flow  from 
the  relieved  are  as  incense  wafted  to  heaven. 
Perhaps  in  nothing  has  Christianity  mani- 
fested its  power  over  the  fiery  Japanese 
spirit  more  completely  than  when  it  has 
tamed  the  samurai,  or  member  of  the  old 
military  class,  and  sent  him  out  as  a  good 
Samaritan  to  establish  humanitarian  insti- 
tutions. 

Woman,  too,  has  felt  mightily  the  touch 
of  Christian  uplift.    Confucius  had  no  place 

96 


Japan. 

for  her.  From  many  Buddhist  temples  and 
sacred  mountains  she  is  excluded.  She  could 
claim  no  legal  standing  and  was  a  mere 
chattel,  to  be  disposed  of  as  caprice  might 
dictate.  But  Christianity  has  made  concu- 
binage a  disgrace ;  the  civil  code,  based  upon 
the  Code  Napoleon,  or  Christian  law,  gives 
to  woman  her  legal  status,  guards  her  rights 
of  person  and  property,  and  makes  possible 
her  independent  existence. 

The  hardest  blow  yet  struck  against  the 
damnable  system  of  licensed  prostitution, 
the  curse  of  Japan,  was  struck  by  a  Chris- 
tian missionary,  a  Methodist,  and  if  the 
Christians  are  supported  in  their  effort  I 
undertake  to  say  that  the  day  is  not  distant 
when  they  will  close  every  brothel  in  the 
land. 

Deve:i.oping  Christian  Skntimdnt. 

But  the  case  does  not  rest  here.    The  in- 
fluence of  Christian  sentiment  in  society  has 
7  97 


The  Asiatic  Fie:i.ds. 

made  a  difference  in  the  dealings  of  man 
with  man.  Not  a  judge  upon  the  bench  but 
has  felt  his  moral  backbone  stiffen  by  the 
presence  of  Christian  sentiment  among  the 
people,  and  even  in  the  press. 

Japan  has  recently  set  the  world  an  exam- 
ple by  imprisoning  more  than  one  hundred 
of  her  leading  citizens,  some  of  them  men 
occupying  high  positions  in  her  educational 
system,  because  they  were  found  guilty  of 
accepting  petty  bribes  from  the  publishers 
of  text-books  as  payment  for  their  favorable 
opinions  on  those  books.  While  American 
cities  sit  complacently  to  watch  their  politi- 
cians steal  through  the  exploiting  of  more 
than  one  franchise,  the  city  of  Tokyo  tries, 
convicts,  and  imprisons  some  of  her  leading 
officials  because  they  cheated  in  the  quality 
of  iron  pipes  put  into  her  water  system. 

I  do  not  pretend  to  assert  that  Japanese 
civilization  is  morally  equal  to  that  of  Amer- 
ica at  all  points — not  by  any  means.     Nor 

98 


Japan. 

would  I  have  you  lose  sight  of  the  fact  that 
the  missionaries  to  that  country  have  not 
been  asleep  for  thirty  years.  No  statistics 
can  picture  to  the  mind  the  widespread  in- 
fluence of  Christian  sentiment  already  man- 
ifest in  this  land  so  recently  heathen,  and 
this  influence  is  large  and  out  of  all  propor- 
tion to  the  numbers  of  those  enrolled  as 
Christians. 

Re:vision  o^  Tri:atie:s  and  Resui^ts. 

The  revision  of  the  treaties  lifted  from 
Japan  a  burden  which  was  fast  coming  to  be 
unbearable.  This  is  the  political  side  of  the 
matter.  From  the  Church's  standpoint,  it 
burst  from  the  missionary  his  traveling  pass- 
port fetters  and  set  him  free  to  roam  at 
will,  up  and  down  the  empire,  preaching 
Jesus  and  the  resurrection;  it  changed  the 
feelings  of  the  government  and  people  to- 
ward the  foreigner  and  his  creed;  it  stirred 
the  native  evangelist  with  a  desire  to  see  the 

99  .     ' 


The:  Asiatic  Fiki^ds. 

people  converted ;  it  gave  the  patriot  an  ad- 
ditional reason  for  wishing  to  make  his 
country  worthy  to  march  with  the  Christian 
nations  of  the  Occident;  and  thus  it  threw 
wide  open  the  doors  for  Christian  propa- 
gandism.  Then  came  the  Anglo- Japanese 
alliance,  an  event  which  has  imposed  upon 
Japan  still  greater  obligations  and  induce- 
ments to  measure  up  to  her  best  in  every 
way. 

Failurii;  01^  the:  Moral  System. 

And  this  apparently  leads  to  another  line 
of  thought.  From  the  early  years  of  the 
Meiji  era  Japan  had  depended  upon  general 
education  to  solve  her  difficulties  and  lift 
her  into  a  stable  national  life.  In  pursuance 
of  this  policy  she  has  developed  her  school 
system  to  a  state  of  great  efficiency.  With 
vehement  determination  religion  has  been 
divorced  from  her  schools.  But  it  became 
clear  ''that  education  pure  and  simple  had 

100 


Japan. 

not  bettered  the  morals  of  Japan,"  and  this 
"led  the  emperor  in  1890  to  issue  his  Impe- 
rial Rescript  on  Morals  in  Education.  But 
as  the  Rescript  supplies  no  power  to  live 
the  life  it  recommends  it  becomes  only  a 
moralization."  The  young  man  of  the  gov- 
ernment schools  have  become  skeptical  to 
an  alarming  extent.  Disgusted  with  the 
general  and  moral  degradation  of  the 
priesthood,  cut  loose  from  the  religion  of 
their  fathers,  and  thrust  into  social,  political, 
industrial,  and  commercial  conditions  all 
new  to  them,  these  young  men  are  religious- 
ly and  morally  adrift.  The  waves  of  skep- 
ticism, rationalism,  and  agnosticism  have 
been  rolling  over  Japan,  and  by  many  lead- 
ing men  this  failure  of  their  moral  system 
is  keenly  felt  and  deeply  lamented.  Of  the 
students  in  Japanese  colleges  but  one  in 
seventy  is  a  Christian  communicant;  of  the 
colleges  of  the  United  States  and  Canada 
one  out  of  every  two  is  a  communicant. 

lOI 


The:  Asiatic  FiEi^ds. 

NoTABI.e;  WiTNKSSKS. 

Hence  Baron  Alaejima,  an  ex-cabinet  of- 
ficer, has  recently  said:  "I  firmly  believe 
we  must  have  religion  at  the  basis  of  our 
national  and  personal  welfare.  No  matter 
how  large  an  army  or  navy  we  may  have, 
unless  we  have  righteousness  at  the  founda- 
tion of  our  national  existence  we  shall  fall 
short  of  the  highest  success.  I  do  not  hesi- 
tate to  say  that  we  must  rely  upon  religion 
for  our  highest  welfare.  And  when  I  look 
about  me  to  see  what  religion  we  may  best 
rely  upon,  I  am  convinced  that  the  religion 
of  Christ  is  the  most  full  of  strength  and 
promise  for  the  nation." 

Count  Okuma,  ex-premier,  laments  the 
loss  of  moral  fiber,  and  says :  "The  efforts 
which  Christians  are  making  to  supply  to 
the  country  a  high  standard  of  conduct  are 
welcomed  by  all  right-thinking  people.  As 
you  read  your  Bible  you  may  think  it  is 

102 


Japan. 

antiquated,  out  of  date.  The  words  it  con- 
tains may  so  appear,  but  the  noble  Hfe 
which  it  holds  up  to  admiration  is  some- 
thing that  will  never  be  out  of  date,  how- 
ever much  the  world  may  progress.  Live 
and  preach  this  life,  and  you  will  supply  to 
the  nation  just  what  it  needs  at  the  present 
juncture." 

The:  Church's  Opportunity. 

This  Is  the  Church's  opportunity  in  Japan. 
Now  while  her  leading  men  stand  favorable 
to  the  inculcation  of  Christian  principles; 
while  the  minds  of  the  people  are  open  to 
receive  the  truth;  now,  when  God  has, 
through  a  victorious  war,  through  im- 
proved international  relations,  and  through 
the  failure  of  their  moral  system,  flung  wide 
open  the  doors,  is  the  Church's  supreme 
opportunity. 

We    should   seize    this    opportunity   first 

through  increased  direct  evangelistic  work. 

103 


The:  Asiatic  Fie:IvDS. 

This  is  the  Church's  first  and  greatest  busi- 
ness, to  preach  the  Gospel  to  the  forty-seven 
millions  of  Japan ;  and  to  this  supreme  duty 
all  other  agencies  should  be  subordinated. 
To  preach  that  "Gospel  in  the  language  of 
the  people  is  the  missionary's  highest  joy. 
But  to  do  this  we  must  have  more  men  and 
more  money. 

Our  present  force  all  over  the  field  is 
v^orking  to  the  danger  point.  Our  Mission 
has  not  been  so  depleted  in  ten  years  as  at 
present.  One  of  our  old  stations,  Nagoya, 
fourth  city  in  the  empire,  has  stood  five 
years  without  an  American  male  missionary. 
The  first  and  greatest  need  is  for  young 
men,  the  best  from  the  schools,  who  shall 
take  the  field,  acquire  the  language,  and  be 
ready  for  leadership  to  take  the  places  of 
the  falling  pioneers.  Then  we  need  money 
for  native  preachers ;  not  a  sudden  large  in- 
crease, so  as  to  demoralize  self-support,  but 
money  especially  for  new  work.     Millions 

104 


Japan. 

upon  millions  of  the  people  have  never 
heard  of  Christ.  Their  minds  are  open. 
They  await  something  new.  Of  religion 
they  have  enough,  but  the  Gospel  famine  is 
something  awful  to  behold.  Why  may  not 
Japan  have  the  Gospel  now?  Is  this  ex- 
cessive asking  for  a  land  where  only  one  in 
one  thousand  of  the  population  is  a  Church 
member,  where  the  heathen  temples  still 
outnumber  the  Protestant  communicants, 
and  where  the  people  crowd  about  us  at  the 
rate  of  three  hundred  per  square  mile,  while 
the  United  States  has  but  twenty-six  and 
China  ninety-six  to  the  square  mile? 

Christian    Schooi.s. 

We  should  seize  this  opportunity  through 
Christian  schools.  These  schools  from  the 
first  have  been  both  the  entering  wedge  and 
a  source  of  strength.  The  Japanese  are  a 
reading  people.  Eighty-one  and  one  half 
per  cent  of  the  school  population  are  ac- 

105 


The:  Asiatic  Fii^lds. 

tually  in  the  schools.  The  daily  papers 
from  the  morning  press  fall  like  snowflakes 
over  the  land.  The  selection  of  books 
found  upon  the  shelves  of  bookstores  in 
Tokyo  compares  favorably  with  those  of 
London,  Paris,  New  York,  Philadelphia,  or 
even  Boston.  The  commercial  value  of  the 
English  language  is  known,  and  it  is  a  re- 
quired study  in  the  schools  of  the  country, 
where  the  children  are  learning  to  think  in 
English.  Even  the  jinrikisha  coolies  often 
£pend  their  waiting  moments  in  studying 
an  English  reader.  But  the  government 
schools  are  nonreligious,  agnostic,  and  often 
antichristian. 

Reasons  for  Christian  Schools. 

We  must  have  the  Christian  schools  for 
our  Christian  constituency,  for  the  prepara- 
tion of  our  ministry,  and  for  the  many  who 
choose  to  commit  their  sons  and  daughters 
to  Christian  rather  than  to  the  government 

io6 


Japan. 

schools  of  skepticism  and  loose  morals.  Yet 
not  one  of  our  eleven  schools  but  needs 
immediate  financial  help.  For  years  the 
Church's  gifts  have  been  so  meager  that  we 
could  neither  rear  new  buildings  nor  repair 
the  old.  Our  college  building,  wrecked  by 
the  great  earthquake  of  1894,  has  never 
yet  been  replaced.  The  Methodist  Episco- 
pal Church  has  put  millions  into  the  great 
Church  schools  at  home,  and  we  are  glad. 
If  we  had  $20,000  for  Aoyama  we  could 
replace  our  buildings  and  make  room  for 
students  enough  to  render  the  school  self- 
supporting. 

And  the  results  justify  the  expenditure. 
Our  graduates  hold  high  positions  in 
Church  and  State,  manage  the  great  com- 
mercial companies,  and  serve  in  positions 
of  highest  trust  at  home  and  abroad.  An 
Aoyama  man  won  honors  in  English  Litera- 
ture this  year  at  the  University  of  Chicago. 
An  Aoyama  and  later  a  Syracuse  man  heads 

107 


The:  Asiatic  Fields. 

the  banking  system  of  Korea.  These  are 
Christian  men,  and  with  proper  support 
we  can  continue  to  fill  posts  of  honor  and 
power  with  Christian  men  and  women  who 
cannot  be  bought. 

A    Christian    Press. 

We  must  seize  this  opportunity  through 
a  Christian  press.  Here  Methodism  has 
unique  opportunities  in  Japan.  Not  only 
does  the  national  thirst  for  reading  urge 
us  on,  but  other  Protestant  denominations, 
recognizing  us  as  having  a  sort  of  right  of 
way  through  priority  in  opening  this  branch 
of  work,  patronize  our  press  and  deal  large- 
ly through  our  Publishing  House.  The 
Sunday  school  literature  for  those  Churches 
is  furnished  by  us,  and  we  are  printing  an 
edition  of  the  Union  Hymnal  for  all  Prot- 
estantism. Many  government  offices  and 
libraries  intrust  us  with  large  orders.     But 

we  are  not  keeping  up  with  the  demand  and 

io8 


Japan. 

cannot.  Mr.  Cowen,  our  hard-working 
agent,  is  seriously  overtaxed.  Our  present 
plant  is  quite  inadequate.  We  need  better 
workmen,  better  machinery,  better  build- 
ings. One  native  church,  seeing  the  need, 
has  raised  10,000  yen  toward  a  building  for 
its  use  and  Publishing  House  combined,  a 
building  which  shall  be  to  all  Japanese 
Methodism  what  the  Methodist  Book  Con- 
cern in  New  York  was  to  early  American 
Methodism.  We  need  $25,000  at  once  to 
enable  us  to  hold  the  position  already  won. 
If  we  do  not  enlarge,  our  co-laborers  of 
other  Churches  will  feel  compelled  to  occupy 
the  ground.  Must  we  lose  this  golden  op- 
portunity, this  chance  to  supply  47,000,000 
people  with  Christian  literature?  Not  un- 
less Methodism  has  lost  her  hold  on  God! 
Give  us  a  united  Methodism  for  Japan: 
not  seven  sickly  theological  schools,  but  one 
good  one;  not  a  half-dozen  sickly  colleges, 
but  one  good  one  with  feeders  thereto;  not 

109 


The;  Asiatic  Fie:i,ds. 

two  or  three  attempts  at  publishing,  doomed 
to  faikire  from  the  start,  but  one  powerful 
press  run  for  Christ  and  his  kingdom.  Stop 
playing  with  the  question  of  episcopal  su- 
pervision of  our  foreign  fields,  and  give 
us  one  of  our  best  general  superintendents 
for  Japan  and  Korea,  with  episcopal  resi- 
dence for  four  years  at  a  time  in  Tokyo, 
and  others  for  China  —  large,  princely 
men,  prophets,  men  of  faith  —  and  help  us 
to  capture  whole  empires  for  Christ. 

Japan  and  the:  Orie:nt. 

In  saving  Japan  you  save  the  Orient. 
Japan  is  already  in  practical  control  of 
Korea.  She  owns  strategic  railroads,  tele- 
graph lines,  banks,  and  large  commercial 
interests.  Japan  is  sending  hundreds  of  her 
picked  men  into  China.  They  are  reorgan- 
izing her  army;  are  advisers  to  her  gov- 
ernment; are  police  organizers  and  teach- 
ers;  are   putting   her   schools   into   shape; 

no 


Japan. 

are  heads  of  business  enterprise;  are  draft- 
ing her  new  code  of  civil  law ;  are  managing 
her  Imperial  University.  Little  Japan  lead- 
ing old  China !  Why,  two  thousand  Chinese 
students  are  in  the  schools  of  Tokyo,  and 
among  them  are  the  sons  of  Chinese  nobles ; 
and  of  these  students  more  than  a  hundred 
are  Chinese  girls.  Over  one  hundred  Chi- 
nese noncommissioned  military  officers  are 
in  Japanese  barracks  getting  their  training 
for  war.  And,  if  these  Chinese  students 
and  these  Japanese  can  be  Christianized, 
what  does  this  mean  to  the  Orient?  Re- 
member the  trumpet  call  of  Bishop  Moore, 
"As  Japan  goes  so  goes  the  Orient." 

Japan   and  Russia. 

I  would  help  Japan  save  China.    I  would 

help  her  build  a  wall  so  high  and  strong 

that  the  Russian  bear  could  neither  scale 

it  nor  crawl  through  it;  for  be  it  known 

unto  you  that  wherever  that  bear  places  his 

III 


Th^  Asiatic  Fiei^ds. 

paw  there  is  an  end  to  Protestant  missions 
and  ultimately  to  American  commerce. 

O  that  the  Church  of  God  would  grasp 
her  opportunity  in  the  Orient! 

•'  What  have  I  thought  of  His  work  so  dear  ? 
What  have  I  planned  for  his  kingdom  here  ? 
What  have  I  given  of  the  wealth  he  gave  ? 
What  have  I  learned  of  his  power  to  save  ? 
What  have  I  done  that  the  world  may  see 
What  Jesus  did  when  he  died  for  me  ?" 
112 


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1    1012  01234  0974 


Date  Due 


